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I'm Sticking With You

by Smriti Halls, illustrated by Steve Small

Interest age: 4 to 5

Published by Simon & Schuster, 2020

  • Picture books

About this book

Bear and Squirrel are best friends. Bear is all in: she’s there to listen to all squirrel’s ideas, have tea parties and eat cake. Yet, Squirrel finds that Bear takes up rather a lot of space. So much space, in fact, that Squirrel needs to get away.

Without Bear, it’s so much easier for Squirrel to keep everything in its right place, without it being sneezed on, sat on or generally destroyed. Yet, when Squirrel is reminded of their lovely tea parties, she starts to miss Bear. It’s just not the same when they’re not together.

This adorable rhyming book about the ups and downs of friendship is pitched perfectly for 3-5 year olds who may be negotiating new friendships at school or nursery, or ongoing sibling relationships that definitely have high and low points. We can all relate to the frustration of someone messing up our stuff, but we might also miss all the fun we have with those friends when they’re not around.

Perfect for calming tempers and ruffled feathers.

About the author

Smriti Halls is an award-winning, critically acclaimed children's author, published in more than 30 languages worldwide. Her books include #1 bestseller I Love You Night and Day, I'm Sticking with You, Elephant in My Kitchen and The Little Island.

With a cast of characters as varied as mischievous monsters and disgruntled geese, she explores relationship and identity; the personal and the political; how it feels to be in your own skin - and in someone else's. Her books, often fast-paced and funny or lyrical and tender, are always full of heart and hope and speak to the child in all of us.

Smriti also creates bold board books to engage the very smallest readers, young fiction for newly independent readers and beautiful, highly illustrated non-fiction for older readers including the award-winning The Ways of the Wolf.

The Little Island is currently shortlisted for the 2020 Little Rebels Award and the 2020 Teach Primary Awards, while I'm Sticking With You was the Independent Bookshops Children's Book of the Month for August 2020. Her forthcoming picture book Rain Before Rainbows (illustrated by David Litchfield) has been made available ahead of publication in partnership with Save the Children as a free e-book to support their work with families most affected by the coronavirus pandemic.

Smriti works widely with children and adults in schools, libraries, festivals, bookshops and prisons to bring a love of reading and stories to the widest possible audience. She lives in London and is also published as Smriti Prasadam-Halls.

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