Where Is Home, Little Pip?

Little Pip the penguin is warned by her parents not to wander, but she ignores their advice and finds herself far from home. So she sets off to look for it, asking help from friendly whales, seagulls and husky dogs along the way.

Karma Wilson’s text is competent and often charming, using a combination of repetition and verse to lift the prose. The illustrations by Jane Chapman may please very young children but I found them too cleaned up and saccharine for my taste – is Antarctic ice really candyfloss pink? And the huskies remind me of Labradoodles, not wild animals. Are penguins to share the fate of bears and more recently, rabbits? Are they destined to appear in sweet, safe books for ever more?

Luckily there are other ‘penguin’ books out there, like Lost and Found by Oliver Jeffers and Penguin by Polly Dunbar. Still, Little Pip is a pleasant enough book, useful for reading aloud at home or in the classroom.