A touching story of how two friends feel when they separate and try to manage without each other. Prize-winning illustrator Oliver Jeffers specialises in spare illustrations which are warm hearted but also capture the deep sadness of being alone in the world. Here a little boy and a penguin are the firmest of friends who are never happier than when they are playing their favourite game. Until, one day, Penguin feels he must try to fly. Penguin sets off on his personal quest but without his best friend at his side nothing seems to go right. How the two friends find each other in the nick of time is a beautifully told in words and pictures.
You can now download an activity sheet with text and illustrations by Oliver Jeffers from the Readers Guide section on the right hand side of this page.
In this much-anticipated sequel to the internationally best-selling picture book Lost and Found, we re-visit the boy and the penguin after their trip to the South Pole! The boy and the penguin still enjoy spending all their time together! That is, until the penguin starts to dream of flying, ignoring the boys advice that it is impossible. Running away, the penguin visits place after place, searching for a chance to get his feet off the ground. But will flying be everything he had hoped? And is the boy missing him, as much as he is missing the boy? A heart-warming story about friendship, love and reaching for your dreams, from highly-regarded, multi-award-winning author-illustrator Oliver Jeffers.
An uplifting story! Pictures of such spare beauty suffused with a dreamlike quality. IndependentOnline
Oliver Jeffers makes impressive use of space in this affecting story of friendship. Illustrations capture feelings of loss and loneliness through the most delicate nuances of facial expression and body language. Julia Eccleshare, The Guardian
Beautifully illustrated, simple warm story - little children will love to share it. Carousel
My picture book of the year, a joyful exploration of the power of friendship. Irish Independent
Praise for How to Catch a Star:
The best recent picture book by light years, is stylishly spellbinding. Telegraph
A story about possibilities and disappointments with a triumphant ending, all of which Jeffers captures through the beautifully expressive changing moods of his little boy. The Guardian
This is a magical, beautifully illustrated tale about reaching for dreams. Mail on Sunday
Hail to new talent! If only all picture books could be this good. The Bookseller
Praise for The Incredible Book Eating Boy:
Mouth-wateringly irresistible. The Guardian
This is a book that children will devour. The Observer
The whole thing looks good enough to eat. TES
With The Incredible Book Eating Boy, Jeffers has produced his most appealing work yet, conjuring up a magical piece of fiction that is not only divinely illustrated and wittily told, but perfectly realised. Junior
Author
About Oliver Jeffers
Oliver Jeffers has won numerous awards and delighted millions of kids and parents alike with his beautifully hand illustrated stories.
Jeffers's picture books are wonderfully accessible. They explore themes of friendship, loneliness, independence and imagination. He has written and illustrated, or "made", as he prefers to put it, five hugely successful picture books. The first three - the "boy books" - feature a small boy who sets off on a series of daunting quests. How to Catch a Star (2004), the first of them, was inspired by a Brer Rabbit story he read as a child. In Lost and Found (2005) the boy heroically rows to the south pole for the sake of an unhappy penguin, and in The Way Back Home (2007) he rescues a young Martian whose spaceship has crashed on the moon.
The Heart and the Bottle is wholly compelling for the importance of its message and the brilliance of how that is conveyed in words and pictures. This is a book to return to time and time again says Julia Eccleshare, Lovereading4kids’ editorial expert.
Jeffers was born in Australia in 1977 and brought up in Belfast. He studied visual communication at the University of Ulster, and graduated in 2001. Jeffers became passionate about making picture books when he began to understand the subtle relationship between words and pictures – ‘that was what excited me. Until I got really involved, I hadn't realised how just a few words can totally change the meaning of a picture.’ Now living in New York, he works as a painter, designer, printmaker and installation artist, but remains very busy making picture books.
Did you know?
Oliver loves plastic food, suitcase handles and Elvis, and has developed a bizarre habit of endlessly writing lists he never reads. He remains hell bent on travelling all over the world.
You can see Oliver talking about his artwork in this video:
We have a super set of Oliver Jeffers activity pages to download :
