Violet Mackerel's Brilliant Plot - Softcover

Anna Branford

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1406326933 ISBN 13: 9781406326932

Publisher: Walker & Company, 2012

Synopsis

This is a new character series for 6-9s featuring the funny, quirky Violet Mackerel - a girl with a mission to think outside the box. Violet Mackerel has her own philosophies on life, and she's ready to put them into practice! Living with her eccentric, creative family, she learns to think differently about things and people - not to mention how to knit, garden (or rather, how not to garden) and make things. In book 1, Violet is smitten by a blue china bird at the market, but she doesn't have any money to buy it. What she needs is a brilliant Violet Mackerel plot! Series reflects the movement for "happiness philosophy" - creative, environmentally-aware kids make their own fun - and chaos! Book includes a guide to making your own "Box of Small Things" - visit our associated website for more Violet things to do and make! This book is written by new Australian writer Anna Branford, niece of Henrietta Branford. Other titles include: "Violet Mackerel's Remarkable Recovery"; "Violet Mackerel's Natural Habitat" (2013); and, "Violet Mackerel's Personal Space" (2013).

About this title

About the Author

Anna Branford was born on the Isle of Man, but spent her childhood in Sudan, Papua New Guinea and Australia. Once, when she was very itchy with the chicken pox, her dad read her the Very Hungry Caterpillar thirty times in a row. Anna lectures in Sociology at Victoria University, Australia, and spends her evenings writing children's stories, kept company by a furry black cat called Florence. She also makes dolls using recycled fabric and materials. Sam Wilson graduated from Kingston University in 1999. The Violet Mackerel books are the first titles she has illustrated for children. She says, "It has been such fun drawing Violet, she is a gorgeous character with such an adventurous spirit." Sam lives in the Staffordshire countryside.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Violet Mackerel is quite a small girl, but she has a theory.

Her theory is that when you are having a very important and brilliant idea, what generally happens is that you find something small and special on the ground. So whenever you spy a sequin, or a stray bead, or a bit of ribbon, or a button, you should always pick it up and try very hard to remember what you were thinking about at the precise moment when you spied it, and then think about that thing a lot more. That is Violet’s theory, which she calls the Theory of Finding Small Things.

“Wake up, Violet,” says Violet’s mama. “It’s nearly five o’clock.”

It is Saturday, which is market day. Violet yawns. It is still dark. Mama’s hair is a bit damp from her shower and it smells like mangoes and blossoms. Violet leans forward for a snuggle and nearly falls asleep again.

“Just stay awake until we’re all in the van,” says Mama. “Then you can sleep as much as you like.”

Violet’s big brother, Dylan, and big sister, Nicola, are already awake, and they are helping to load up the van with fold-up tables and chairs, the big canopy umbrella, and boxes and baskets of Mama’s knitting. They are going to the market like they do every Saturday morning, to sell the woolly things Mama makes.

Violet thinks she would quite like to wear her pajama bottoms under her skirt today. They feel nice and warm from bed. Sometimes if you say things like “Can I wear my pajama bottoms to the market?,” people say things like “No.” But if you just put your skirt on over the top, and have your eyebrows slightly raised like someone who is thinking of something very important and interesting, no one says anything at all.

When Violet, Mama, Nicola, and Dylan arrive at the market, even though it is still not properly light, lots of people are already there, bundled up and rubbing their hands together with coldness, unfolding and unpacking their things to sell. No one notices Violet’s pajama bottoms.

Violet’s favorite person at the market (apart from Mama and Dylan and Nicola and herself) is a man who never smiles. He sells china birds, small enough to fit in the palm of your hand, and he is there every week. Violet says hello to him as she always does, and he doesn’t even look up, which he never does. But after waking up at nearly five o’clock in the morning, Violet doesn’t feel much like chatting or smiling either. So she feels that even though he never says hello back, she and the man might share a sort of understanding.

The man’s china birds are all different and all very dirty. Dylan says that they are probably brand-new from a factory. He thinks the man has just put dirt on them so that they will look ancient and he can sell them for ten dollars instead of two. But Violet doubts it. She thinks it is much more likely that he is an archaeologist. She suspects that he specializes in digging up ancient china birds.

Violet would quite like to own one of the man’s birds in particular. It is made of pale blue china, the color of a robin’s egg. It is always right at the back of the table.

And just as she is having that thought, out of the corner of her eye, Violet spies a small red button on the dusty market ground.

About this edition

• Publisher: Walker & Company
• Publication date: 2012
• ISBN 10: 1406326933
• ISBN 13: 9781406326932
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 80