Two new neighbours playing 'Three Little Pigs' discover that friends are what make a house a home. Clancy has just moved house. He is missing his old house terribly - the new house is much too big and much too lonely. How will he ever make it his home? As despair takes hold Clancy hears a small voice. Soon, Clancy, with the help of his new friend Millie, is building towers to the sky and trains to the street outside, and together they build the home that Clancy thought he had lost forever.

About the Author

Libby Gleeson has written over 30 books for children, she is one of Australia's most prolific and most loved authors for children. Her first collaboration with Freya Blackwood was the award-winning Amy and Louis. Clancy and Millie and the Very Fine House is her first book with Little Hare Books. Freya Blackwood is a rising star in the Australian and international children's book scene. She is a multi-award winning illustrator and has most recently illustrated Her Mother's Face, written by Roddy Doyle. Clancy and Millie and the Very Fine House is her second book with Little Hare. The adorable Ivy Gives written and illustrated by Freya is being published in Board Book in September 2010!

Reviews

PreS-Gr 2-Young Clancy moves with his parents from their small suburban home to a much larger house in a different neighborhood. He finds the rooms too expansive and the view at night from his window "too big." His mother and father think that "It's a very fine dwelling." While hiding in one of the many moving boxes outside, Clancy hears a friendly voice that coaxes him out. Millie wants to join him, and together they configure boxes into towers and trains, and play out the story of "The Three Little Pigs." Clancy declares the third house an impressive superstructure, "a very fine dwelling." Gleeson's text captures the boy's emotions as he adjusts to the change and makes a new friend. Blackwood's outstanding illustrations use laser print from the scans of pencil drawings, watercolors, and gouache on the backs of large brown envelopes. Muted browns and grays are juxtaposed with bright reds and oranges for the clothing and children's features. Perspective provides depth and compassion. In one of many insets, Clancy and his toy dog sit in their "cubby house" underneath the kitchen table in his old home and share the spread with a long view of the large new kitchen. Another spread features an aerial view of the neighborhood and a train made of the boxes winding around the yard. Cloud images in shapes of pigs follow Clancy through the story. A great choice for reading to a group or sharing one-on-one.-Anne Beier, Clifton Public Library, NJ (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Australians Gleeson and Blackwood, who previously collaborated on Half a World Away, portray with sensitivity a small boy's ambivalence about moving to a new house. " It's a very fine dwelling,' says Clancy's father. It's too big,' whispers Clancy." Blackwood exaggerates the building's imposing exterior and its rooms, with towering walls, windows that seem miles away, and chilly gray expanses of floor, emphasizing the enormity of the move for Clancy. Smaller insets picture the family's old house: "Clancy remembers the skylight and the moon." When Millie, a neighbor, finds Clancy sitting moodily in a moving box, the two begin a game of Three Little Pigs: "[T]his is my house of bricks and the big bad wolf can't come in," Clancy explains, piling moving boxes high. Blackwood signals their seriousness and Clancy's changing feelings by drawing the house they construct on the same monumental scale as those that surround it. "It's a very fine dwelling," Clancy says, surveying its teetering, sky-high turrets. Though the story deals with a particular childhood dilemma, Clancy's feelings are conveyed with a dignity that should appeal to a wide audience. Ages 3-6. (Nov.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

""Written and illustrated with sensitivity and flair, this large-format picture book will resonate with other children who have felt out of place in new surroundings." --"Booklist