About the Book

One December morning, James is thrilled to wake up to see snow falling.

He spends the whole day making his perfect snowman; he has coal eyes, an old green hat and scarf and a tangerine nose… just like the snowman from his favourite story.

That night, something magical happens- the Snowman comes to life!

He and James take to the skies on a magical adventure where they meet someone very special.

 

My Thoughts

I’m a huge fan of Raymond Briggs’ The Snowman – I remember reading the picture book in the library as a young child, and I have such a fondness for the film adaptation that’s on TV every year. I can’t resist watching it even now as a grown adult! So when I heard that Michael Morpurgo was writing a novella based on the original book of The Snowman I was super intrigued and knew I had to get my hands on a copy! I’m so happy to say that I really enjoyed it!

The Snowman story is very similar to the original picture book with a young boy excitedly playing out in the snow and building a snowman. Then he wakes in the night and finds the snowman has come to life, and off they go on an adventure after exploring the boy’s house. It’s not just the picture book in words though, this book references the original The Snowman as it’s James’ favourite book and some of what the two get up to together are a little different.

This is such a lovely, magical book and I would have loved to have had this when I was a child. It’s always a bit of a worry when someone writes a variant of an old favourite but Morpurgo has been so respectful of the original story and this stands alongside it as an extra Snowman story that is just as wonderful. I definitely recommend this!

A gorgeous, magical and nostalgic read!

I received a copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley. All thoughts are my own.

The Snowman is out now and available here.

 

About the Author

Multi-award winning author, Michael Morpurgo, is one of Britain’s best-loved writers for children and has won many prizes, including the Smarties Prize, The Writers Guild Award and the Blue Peter Book Award for his novel, Private Peaceful, which has also had two successful runs as a play devised by Bristol Old Vic. From 2003 to 2005 he was the Children’s Laureate, a role which took him all over the UK to promote literacy and reading, and in 2005 he was named the Booksellers Association Author of the Year.