A review of our author visit

Our Author and Illustrator Visit

Spellbinding Tales

It all started when Tracey Corderoy was a little girl and truly feared that the wrinkly old lady with a wart on her nose who sat on her rocking chair and watched her through the window was really a nasty, wicked witch.

Now, some years on, Tracey has written a series of books sparked by that memory about a little girl called Pandora with a granny who’s a witch, a rather nice one at that, and some of their adventures were vividly brought to life in BGS Infants with the help of illustrator Joe Berger.

Both Year 2 classes listened spellbound as Tracey read two of her books – Hubble Bubble Granny Trouble and Spells-a-Popping, Granny’s shopping - with tales of frog poop soup, a broomstick instead of a car and bats for pets.

Joe explained how the drawings of Granny were based on his own rather stylish grandmother and how after several weeks of preliminary sketches, it takes him about a day to complete each of the 12 final versions of each double page illustration.

After Joe sketched Tracey and then turned her into a witch with his pen, the children drew some pictures of themselves before making mini cauldrons and magic frogs to take home.

Tracey, an award winning writer who has had more than 45 books published, then headed off with Joe to weave her magic with the Year 1 and Reception classes.

Tracey read No!, the very entertaining tale of a toddle rhino who discovers the word and then can’t stop saying it. And then the children drew and designed their own t-shirt for him.

Ben Whitehead, Head of Infants, said: “Tracey and Joe were fantastic with the children and really brought the books to life in a truly compelling and inspiring way.”

by Lizzie Peck