WeirDo #6: Crazy Weird! product reviews

We love Weir Do in our house, and my eldest and I have read every book put out so far, we were thrilled to have book 6 in the review goodies this time. But not as thrilled as our youngest. She recently asked for a Weir Do book for bedtime and loved it so she was very keen to have them read to her. She even managed to skip in front of the queue!

When I went to put her to bed, I noticed the book was on her bed and slightly shoved under her covers. I think she thought that if she hid the book, her sister wouldn't find it and she could have it to herself. I asked "what is that hiding there". She giggled and held it up proudly, running her fingernails across the cover. The cover is textured because it has a moving image on it, so I showed her how to make the chicken fly across the picture. She was very happy to play with that for some time.

I asked her if I could read the book to her and she nodded and we settled down for it. I read this in chapter lots over the week and every time I read, she was fully interested in the story. She asked about the dentist and wondered about braces. She is a thumb sucker, so I suspect that it is something she will have to have herself. She thought that Weir was very funny and she loved the illustrations inside the book as well.

Once I finished reading the book and she was "almost done" playing with the magic cover, I asked if I could then let her sister hear the story and that was okay. My eldest is getting more out of the book than the youngest did. It deals with some good stuff around looks and differences and what makes you unique. This was a message that my eldest could benefit from because she is going through a lot of self assessment and thinking herself ugly. It's hard, so when a book like this comes along and deals with those issues at her level it speaks more to her than my words can. Self acceptance really is the key to happiness and I want that for her, so I think this was a great step in the right direction.

My son loves the Weirdo series so he was super excited to receive the latest book to review. In this book Weir goes to the dentist and ends up coming home with braces. He has a hard time accepting them which then leads to all sorts of misunderstandings and mishaps on the school field trip to the fun fair.

We read the whole book in one sitting - yes, that is how much my son loves these books, he wouldn't let me put it down! I didn't think this book was as funny as some of the previous books in the series and Weir's struggles with coming to term with his braces gave it a more serious tone. However, there were still a few laughs which is what we've come to expect from these books and a happy ending with a bit of a twist.

As far as chapter books go, it's a fairly simple read with only a few sentences on each page interspersed with plenty of black and white illustrations. My son (age 8) has no problem reading this book independently and you know you're onto a winner when he wants to read it over and over again. I would recommend reading the other books in the series first (if you haven't already) as they give you a lot of backstory and information about the characters and their relationships which there isn't much of in this book.