Tom's Big Day and Other Stories

These are short stories in which the emphasis is on family and friendship. Elizabeth Day tells of two families and their small sons, Tom and Andrew, first cousins who become firm friends. Andrew, whose family lives in a large town, spends a wonderful week on Tom s family s farm, and is thrilled when his parents decide to move to the country. The reader can feel the strong relationships between characters. An idyllic picture of country life, where every resident of the small village knows one another and is always eager to help out, and where the community rallies round to put on events; it is a really uplifting story about the decent side of human nature. Elizabeth Day has a good knowledge of rural village life and events are vividly described to capture the imagination. You can almost smell the hot dogs sizzling and hear the fireworks crackling overhead at the Bonfire Night display. By infiltrating the mind of a child and narrating most of the events through his point of view, the reader is given a unique perspective of what it is like to grow up in the countryside. Children will enjoy hearing this and other heart-warming stories