It is Summer. Marcie and her family own a caravan park. Marcie has a older sister who is crazy about tennis and a young brother who is crazy about his pet fish. Marcie is in the middle. This summer is a time of change because Marcie's beloved Grandmother is in hospital. Marcie has the task to look after Gran's caravan and more importantly to look after Gran's cat - George. One day Gran gives Marcie an ancient wishing stone and so the magic begins.
One small incident in the story involves a town competition to decorate your business for Christmas. Marcie and a team of her friends work hard to make the caravan park look terrific in hope of winning the cash prize. They make hundreds of paper flowers echoing the beautiful roses which were originally planted around the caravan park by Gran and her late husband.
The council run competition reminded me of The Christmas Caravan which is a long time favourite Christmas story of mine.
The town competition also reminded me of one I read about recently in this new book My Brother Ben (written for a slightly older audience).
Marcie does feel like a real girl in this story with her ups and downs of mood, her questions about life, her pesky siblings and her need to understand her parent's problems but it is the cat, George, who really steals the show.
I can't highlight one special moment or plot point from this book but I do recommend it because it is sweet summer story set in Australia featuring a likeable young girl and her grandmother's very special and wise cat. Young readers aged 8+ (with some reading stamina because it is 244 pages) will enjoy this book or you could use it as a summer family read aloud.
Blurb from Penguin: Marcie Gill hasn’t had a great start to the Christmas holidays. Her parents aren’t talking to each other and the family business – the Snorkel Bay Caravan Park – is in financial trouble. Her younger brother will only talk about his 23 goldfish and her sister is obsessed with tennis. To make matters worse her gran is in the hospital after a bad fall and won’t be home for ages. But then something magical happens. Something that involves a Christmas competition, a black cat called George and a wishing stone. Marcie is about to discover that if you wish hard enough, dreams can come true.
Here is the trailer. In this video Monica and Danny talk about their book. Here is a set of simple activity pages.
Danny Snell is the illustrator of Somewhere in Australia; Seagull; Jeremy; and the wonderful book The Fire Wombat.
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