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Claude at the Beach

by Alex T. Smith

Peachtree Publishers        4/01/ 2014

978-1-56145-703-8

Age 7 to 9           96 pages

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“Claude and Sir Bobblysock pack their bags and go on vacation to the beach. After carefully squirting sunscreen from the tip of his nose to the toes of his sensible shoes, Claude is ready for a relaxing day on the sand. Things do not always go as planned, however, and soon he finds himself rescuing a man from a shark, competing in a sand-castle-building contest and hunting for pirate treasure!”

Opening

“At 112 Waggy Avenue, behind a tall front door with a big brass knocker, lives Claude.”

The Story

Claude and Sir Bobblysock live with Mr. and Mrs. Shinyshoes. Each day, after the couple head off to work—at precisely half past eight—Claude and his best friend, Sir Bobblysock, head out for an adventure. Today is a beach day. Wearing his favorite red sweater, Claude packs his travel case, pops on his beret, and leaves the house with Sir Bobblysock hopping behind him.

The beach is busy with lots of things to do. Claude spreads his blanket and Sir Bobblysock falls fast asleep. Wanting to fit in with those at the beach, Claude put on his beach attire, and covered himself in sunscreen and whipped cream—for the beret. This is the normal part of Claude’s beach adventure. From then on, the day took a few strange turns.

There was a shout from the sea, a preoccupied lifeguard, and a hungry shark. A sand castle contest, fantastical castles, and a surprise win. A pirate family invitation, a treasure map, and a small rouge pirate, carrying a big sword, and looking for a lampshade. Claude and Sir Bobblysock must make it home. Mr. and Mrs. Shinyshoes expect to find Clause asleep in his bed. Would Claude and Sir Bobblysock make it home in time? What will be their next adventure?

Review

Claude at the Beach follows on the heels of at the Circus and in the City. Claude goes off on a new adventure, not sure what to do, having never been to the beach. For a first timer—and a dog—Claude finds ways to fit in and even to excel, when he is not causing a bit of trouble. Sir Bobblysock experienced this new adventure as easily as he did the last two.

I like the air of innocence Claude projects, right before he pulls off some heroic act, then goes off for ice cream, and as if what he did, he does every day. How he does this is amusing as much as it is amazing. Wearing water wings and Mr. Shinyshoes’ underwear for a bathing trunk (held up with duct tape), Claude looks like he should be back at the circus. His perseverance is enviable as is his imaginative reactions. If only cats would act more like Claude.

The illustrations look more like graphic art than chapter book images. I like the black and white and red illustrations. The red adds a bit of color to the scenes and diverts your eye to certain areas of the image. The characters remind me of French movies. The clothes and the exaggerated actions reinforce this idea. I think kids will like these digitally created characters and their crazy antics.

Claude at the Beach is as hilarious as the third book. Many times the first book is terrific and those that follow it, eh, not so hot. This is not true of Claude. His adventures are fresh, hilarious, goofy, and over-the-top extravaganzas that are great reads for beginning chapter book readers. Claude and Sir Bobblysock make the most unlikely team, but work well, with Claude doing most of the work. Sir Bobblysock rallies Claude on, as he creates adventures kids will like to read.

CLAUDE AT THE BEACH. Text and illustrations copyright © 2014 by Alex T. Smith. Reproduce by permission of the publisher, Peachtree publishers, Atlanta, GA.

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Learn more about the Claude series HERE.

Claude in the City

Claude at the Circus

  Claude on the Slopes
(coming Fall 2014)

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Buy Claude at the Beach at Amazon—B&N—Peachtree Publishers—your local bookstore.

Meet the author/illustrator, Alex T. Smith, at his website:  http://alextsmith.blogspot.com/

Find more books at the Peachtree Publishers website:    http://peachtree-online.com/ 

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Also by Alex T. Smith

Foxy Tales – The Cunning Plan

Hector and the Big Bad Knight

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.    .  .  .  .  .  . PEACHTREE BOOK BLOG TOUR Claude at the Circus By Alex T. Smith Peachtree Publishers 5 Stars . Back Cover:  Meet Claude. He’s no ordinary dog—he leads an extraordinary life! When his owners leave for the countryside, Claude decides what adventure he will have. What will happen today? Opening:  …

As a final Last Hurrah of the Summer Holiday, M, J and I spent Saturday gone in the wonderfully inspiring Discover Centre in London. Part soft play centre, part adventure playground, part kids’ bookshop, part interactive kids “museum” with buttons to press, ropes to pull, and costumes to dress up in, Discover defies easy description. But the glue that binds all these different aspects together is stories, and in particular telling and playing stories together.

So you can imagine how we at Playing by the book were rather excited to be there!

Various themed spaces include props to encourage creative play, and everywhere there are baskets crammed with books. You can sit and read, run about and play, explore, dance, and literally let your imagination run riot.

We’d gone there to meet up with some fellow children’s book lovers: Read It Daddy, Polly from The Little Wooden Horse, Helen from Capptivated Kids, and Elli from Taking Words for a Stroll. We were truly a babble of book bloggers – in seventh heaven as our kids played wonderfully well together and we got to let down our hair a little too.

There’s an amazing playground outside at Discover – exactly what all playgrounds should be like – with climbing frames and slides begging for stories to be told about them. Not just objects to burn up energy on, but characters in adventures to be played out. With plenty of nooks and crannies, outdoor musical instruments, shady spots and sun traps, why can’t all play spaces be this imaginative?

As well as creating themed play spaces (some are permanent, whilst others change during the year), Discover hosts lots of visits by authors and illustrators, and none other than Alex T Smith, the brilliant creator of the Claude books (absolutely perfect for newly fluent readers, just moving into chapter books), as well as several gorgeous picture books including Primrose, Ella and Egg, was holding a session whilst we were there.

Alex made me cry with the beautiful stories of how his Grandpa used to write stories for Alex, about what Alex’s toys got up to when Alex was at school. What a great inspiration! Then we all had lots of fun learning how to draw Claude, with Alex revealing several Top Illustrator Tips along the way.

Alex was brilliant with the large crowd of kids and adults; if you get the chance to see him live, grab it with both hands!

I left really wishing that Discover could replicate itself across the land. Libraries, soft play centres, more conventional museums wanting to attract kids, councils thinking about creating public play areas could all learn a lot from Discover.