The Butterfly Club

Product Information

The Butterfly Club is a voluntary organisation. Our aim is to provide leisure activities in a safe, fun filled environment for children and young adults with special needs, while providing respite for parents/guardians. Double Act won the prestigious Smarties Medal and the Children’s Book Award as well as being highly commended for the Carnegie Medal. The Story of Tracy Beaker won the 2002 Blue Peter People’s Choice Award.

The Butterfly Club is a really good book and a really good story on making new friends. With some nice and mean characters. It is a really good animal story too with lots of illustrations. But will small Tina be able to cope with mean Selma and Kay-Leigh, will Mrs Lovejoy easy down on Tina or will she just have to fend for herself for the next year. Despite Mum's, Phil or Maddie's protests, Tina will be next to Selma. Selma is famous for being a bully and Tina is her ideal victim. Tina learns though that she can stand on her own two feat and that some people aren't as bad as they seem. Tina has new interests and exciting things happen when she is asked to make a butterfly garden with her least favourite classmate.Overall it's very feel-good, although this is the first time I've come across the mention of iPads and Monster High in a JW book which felt strange - crossing over into the next generation of younger readers! There was also something very modern and self aware in the way the triplets' mum tries to get them to see a different perspective on Selma's fractured home life; I found this an important lesson to be incorporated into the book.

Seeing Ruby act as she always wanted too was such a treat and seeing Garnet flourish in her own camera-shy way behind the scenes and making a name for herself via producing/script writing was brilliant. They are both truly still the personalities of Ruby & Garnet from when they were young in 'Double Act'.Tina Maynard - The main character of The Butterfly Club book. She is the smallest out of her sisters, due to a weak heart, and had to stay in hospital for a few days after she had been born. Tina is not encouraged to do sports because of her illness, so she often feels left out. Tina has a special china doll called Baby, who Selma the bully stole and kept to herself. Let me tell you, when I got to THAT bit near the end where I realised the crossover between this and one of JW's earlier books... I got very nerdily excited about all of the characters existing in the same JW universe! I don't exactly know why this surprises and delights me so much; maybe because I've been on such a journey with her books in the last 6 months and to see a connection made between 2 books written by JW 20 years apart felt really lovely. To see these 2 other characters flourishing in adulthood was just wonderful, and the way they've supported Tina in this too.

I loved how Jacqueline included other characters and had a surprising and great twist to the story. I would highly recommend this to children ages seven and up.Jacqueline Wilson wrote her first novel when she was nine years old, and she has been writing ever since. She is now one of Britain's bestselling and most beloved children's authors. She has written over 100 books and is the creator of characters such as Tracy Beaker and Hetty Feather. More than forty million copies of her books have been sold. EOIs for the Melbourne Improv Festival in January are open! If you are an improviser or improv troupe, we want to hear from you. Of course, I always adore the pictures in these books for younger readers! They add to the story in such a special way.