Escape from Silverstreet Farm by Nicola Davies, illustrated by Katharine McEwen, 65 pp, RL 2





Silver Street Farm is a new series of chapter books from Nicola Davies, zoologist and prolific author, and is illustrated by Katherine McEwen. In the first book in the series, Welcome to Silver Street Farm, meet Meera, Gemma and Karl who bond over their love of farm animals and having a farm of their own when they meet at the toy corner in kindergarten. On the last day of elementary school the trio of friends transform a an old, unused train station and out buildings into an urban farm in the middle of the city of Lonchester. Despite the land owner who wants to raze it and turn it into a parking structure, the activism of the three friends garners community support and wins out in the end. Flora MacDonald, a young farmer from Scotland who aids the children in the transformation the train station into a farm, agrees to run it, never forgetting that the Silver Street Farm is their dream. The signal box becomes a chicken coop, two poodle puppies bought by Karl's aunt turn out to be pedigree Shetland lambs and seemingly rotten eggs that hatch into ducklings are among the animals that Flora and the kids tend to.

When Escape from Silver Street Farm begins, it's December 23, the day before the official opening of the farm to the public, and things aren't going quite as planned. Bitzi and Bobo, the sheep, have gone missing and all the turkeys have escaped. Karl and Flora put a harness around Kenelottle Mossworthy Merridale of Morrayside, otherwise known as Kenny the ram, and hope that he will lead them to the missing ewes. Meanwhile, Gemma and Meera begin investigating the hole in the fence and a nearby tunnel leading to the main street of town, arousing their suspicions that a turkey rustler might be at work. Things get crazy when the ewes wander into a grocery store and the turkeys are found huddled inside of a bounce house shaped like a castle (with a baby inside, knocked out of his stroller and into the bounce house by a freak gale) that is about to go over the Marston Park overflow dam! Used to the hard work of running a farm, Meera, Gemma and Karl work just as hard to bring home their animals, all the while trying to think of the perfect Christmas present for Flora. Welcome to Silver Street Farm ends with Sashi, the young reporter from Cosmic TV saying, "Silver Street magic strikes again! I can't wait to see what next year will bring!" I can't wait either!


Books 1 in the Silver Street Farm Series:





 Silver Street Farm books coming soon . . .





More books by Nicola Davies reviewed at books4yourkids.com:



For the five and under crowd:


Who's Like Me? and What Will I Be?


Who Lives Here ? and What Happens Next?




Outside Your Window : A First Book of Nature



For everyone or seven and up as a read-alone don't miss this series of fantastic non-fiction books, including Just the Right Size and Talk, Talk, Squawk!, reviewed here.











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