New books this April!

The Day I Fell Down the Toilet by Stephen Mangan and Anita Mangan

A high-energy, laugh-out-loud, fully illustrated adventure story by much-loved actor Stephen Mangan and talented artist Anita Mangan.

The Queen of Dunny, the land where jokes come from, has lost her sense of humour and banned fun of any kind. Her subjects have one final shot at making her laugh otherwise NO NEW JOKES will be created EVER AGAIN!

Enter the hero the world needs. Timothy Trench: straight-talking, uber-decisive child genius… oh, wait. In an unfortunate case of mistaken identity, the wrong Timothy – a boy who finds it impossible to make decisions – is fetched to make the Queen laugh. Can he work out what will tickle Her Majesty’s funny bone and save the day?

A wildly imaginative, brilliantly silly adventure that’s overflowing with toilet humour!

The Mystery of the Forever Weekend by Lisa Thompson

A gripping, page-turning mystery adventure from the bestselling author of modern classic The Goldfish Boy.

Cory dreads Sunday evenings. It’s school the next day, where a bully is picking on him and he’s struggling to keep up in class. The night before a Monday that will include a maths test and another lonely lunch break, Cory wishes that the weekend would never end… and when he wakes up the next day, time has reset itself to Sunday morning.

This is amazing! He can lounge about all day watching TV, have pizza for dinner over and over again and play the lottery knowing which numbers will win big!

But Cory soon longs for life to move on – can he break the time loop and bring the forever weekend to a close? an all-new, never-before-seen villain unleashes an army of A.I. robots?

Like a Girl by Rebecca Westcott

A powerful, contemporary teen novel about the courage to be yourself in the face of online and in-school peer pressure.

Fourteen-year-old Eden McCoy doesn’t fit in. All she’s good at is running, and she doesn’t even dare join the track team. Her priority is to stay in the shadows and avoid the Glossies – a ruthless clique of girls who use social media to punish and humiliate their targets, led by their queen Bea and her sidekick Mikki.

But one day, Eden breaks her vow to stay unnoticed: she beats track star Mikki in a race. This bold move captures the attention of Bea, who decides Eden needs to either prove her loyalty and become one of the Glossies – or suffer the consequences. And so The Testing begins…

As Eden is challenged to play a cruel prank on another kid or have that same act inflicted on her, her will is pushed to the limit. The only thing keeping her afloat is an unexpected connection with a boy called Riley, a fellow runner who messages her online. But how deep does The Testing run? And how long until Eden breaks?

These Stolen Lives by Sharada Keats

A powerful dystopian thriller from a stunning new voice in YA, set in a world divided by race where life itself must be paid for if you want to survive… *

Six years ago, seventeen-year-old Mora survived the terrifying Skøl invasion. They stole her land. They took her family. And now not even her life is her own. Skøl culture revolves around one motto: Life is Golden. You must pay the government for the right to survive.

Records of every citizen are held at the hallowed, highly secured Life Registry, which tracks who lives and who dies, who pays and who fails.

Colonized survivors like Mora face endless servitude, repaying the ‘debt’ of their years lived before the invasion. Mora is resigned to her fate, finding glimmers of joy in her tentative friendship with another repayer, the handsome, elusive Kit.

But then she finds out that twelve-year-old Zako, the closest thing she has to a brother, is to be put to death by the dangerous new Skøl Governor. Finding the courage to fight back, Mora and Kit conspire to smuggle Zako to safety. But their plan draws them into a dark mystery – and to a heart-pounding mission at the Life Registry itself. They must ultimately ask themselves: what are we worth to each other?

The Map that Led to You* by Ella Mcleod

A long time ago, a witch burst into flames. A pirate and a mermaid fell in love. A map was marked with a glowing X. And a Republic was born.

In the present day, two girls are given a history assignment: to try and piece together the rise and fall of the famous and corrupt pirate Republic, which once formed their island home. As Reggie and Maeve sift fact from fiction, they realise that everything they’ve been told about the Republic is wrong. That the problem with history being told by the victors is that a lot gets left out. That ancient legend might be uncomfortably close to home. As their tentative friendship deepens into something more, they realise that a magical world could be on their very doorstep – if only they could find the map…

Dad’s Bum is So Smelly! by Dawn McMillan and Ross Kinnaird

A brilliantly funny picture book from the hilarious duo behind the phenomenal I Need A New Bum!

There’s a rumble at our place…An explosion! A blast! Something is happening and it’s happening fast!

The hero of the New Bum! series is back and he’s facing a challenge he has NEVER faced before: his dad’s smelly bum! Get ready for guffaws galore in this laugh-out-loud book in the seriously silly New Bum! series.