The Incredibly Boring Monotonous Family (Phil Barry, illus by Charlotte Lance, Pan Macmillan, $14.95 pb, ISBN 9780330424127 , May) ****

Quite unexpectedly, this book had me laughing in embarrassing bursts from the very first page. The Monotonous family are, exactly as their name suggests, the most boring people you can imagine. They dream of blank A4 pages, eat only the blandest foods (vinegared porridge, anyone?) and take great pleasure in a CD recording of the endless numbers of pi. A chance encounter with a mysterious fox leaves Ann (the Monotonous daughter) in possession of a magic key that transforms any room it opens into the most fun place in the world. Ann’s discovery of a life outside her previously boring existence has mixed effects on her family and those around her. The sheer joy of this book comes through its freedom of imagination, which just happens to be the central message of this wonderfully wacky morality tale. Far removed from the dragons, fairies and spies that seem to pervade every corner of today’s children’s fiction, first-time author Barry taps into something far more classical: an inventive, entertaining story, well told. Wonderfully reminiscent of Roald Dahl in both style and content, I wish this book all the success it deserves with children eight to 11 years old (and all others who secretly read it).

Christopher Currie is senior buyer at Avid Reader Bookshop, Brisbane

This review from Australian Bookseller & Publisher magazine is reproduced by kind permission of Thorpe-Bowker, a division of R R Bowker LLC. © Copyright 2008, Thorpe-Bowker

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