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zoearena.bsky.social
Zoe Arena
@zoearena.bsky.social
290 followers 140 following 20 posts
I write picture books.

Debut: MANDY IS STILL A BANANA, Hachette Children’s - out in September!

Agent: James Catchpole.
www.zoearena.com
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nicolettejones.bsky.social
#NewIllustrationoftheDay by author/illustrator David Litchfield from his bestselling The Bear and the Piano, about stardom and family. A tenth anniversary edition is published today, with a pull-out poster. From Frances Lincoln Books (Quarto). This image transports us all into a shaft of sunlight.
February 6, 2025 at 7:36 AM
Reposted by Zoe Arena
whatsfsaid.bsky.social
I think MICHAEL ROSEN'S SAD BOOK by @michaelrosenyes.bsky.social & Quentin Blake is the best book I've ever read about death and grief. It's accessibile even to very young children, but has an honesty and emotional power that is totally ageless. Everyone should read it, however old they are!
Cover of MICHAEL ROSEN's SAD BOOK, by Michael Rosen & Quentin Blake, showing Michael Rosen in the sadness of grief
January 27, 2025 at 6:58 PM
zoearena.bsky.social
Gary! This is brilliant. Absolutely well done!
garypanton.co.uk Gary Panton @garypanton.co.uk · Jan 25
I'm absolutely over the moon to say that #TheNotwitches is The Times' Children's Book of the Week. Huge thanks to @timeslucy.bsky.social for giving it such a lovely review.
This zippy fable is a triumph of nonsense. By Lucy Bannerman This is fun. The biggest compliment l can give The Notwitches is that it feel s like a book children will actually like, and not the kind of book adults desperately want them to like. Is there a plot? Barely. Is it profound? Not at all. It is concerned with much more important things, like hairy motorcycle gangs and jokes about eating stationery. Melanda is an unhappy child "in a very unfortunate situation". She has not one, not two, but three horrid aunts. Think Aunt Sponge and Aunt Spiker from James and the Giant Peach, plus another: "Aunt Thumb, whose bright and baggy clothing might have suggested she was someone with a warmer personality were it not for the fact she had stolen it all from some tents at a music festival." When her grotesque Aunt Claggy isn't eating all the paper, Melanda loves to write scary stories, such as the one about the Crunchy Man who is 209 years old, "has way too many pairs of knees" and wears "scuffed ghost-skin boots that he stole from a haunted fairground". One day, an older girl knocks at the door. She is an endearingly unconvincing witch, wearing a rubbish plastic nose and carrying not so much a broomstick as a broom handle. In July. But her dubious plea to "join the witches" convinces Melanda to run away from home and they begin an adventure that revolves almost entirely round the increasingly silly and surreal conversations with the gnomes, mermaids and sleepy rock monsters they meet along the way. l say mermaids ... these ones are reversed: "Top half of fish . Bottom half of a lady". They run around, "sounding their siren call, 'HIYA!'" The dialogue feels indebted to the surrealist humour of Blackadder or Monty Python's Flying Circus, and the short, funny chapters zip along, making it a good option for youngsters who are still building confidence as independent readers. I can imagine some grown-ups may also enjoy reading this one out loud.
January 25, 2025 at 8:11 PM
zoearena.bsky.social
I’m on a train journey and have just found the complete Withnail & I script. It’s perfection.

Withnail: ‘Warm up!? We may as well sit round a cigarette.’
January 14, 2025 at 8:13 AM
zoearena.bsky.social
Parboil. What a silly word. Have always avoided saying it.
December 27, 2024 at 9:52 AM
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adamcsharp.bsky.social
What Kermit (the frog) is called in ten different countries...

10. Kermit (Denmark)
9. Kermit (France)
8. Kermit (Romania)
7. Kermit (Slovakia)
6. Kermit (Italy)
5. Kermit (Canada)
4. Kermit (Iceland)
3. Kermit (the Netherlands)
2. Kermit (Poland)
1. Gustavo (Spain)
November 18, 2024 at 6:21 PM
zoearena.bsky.social
Hello! Well, that was easy!
November 15, 2024 at 7:31 PM