Flashing Fire Engines

Tony Mitton and Ant Parker
Big, bold fire engines, waiting day and night, ready for a rescue or a blazing fire to fight.
Jump aboard the engine and join a band of brave animal firefighters in this exciting picture book. Zippy wordplay, zappy art, plus a picture dictionary make learning about fire engines fun!
My son received this book in a cardboard truck style set of 10 entitled The Amazing Machines Truckload of Fun. Whilst not able to review each and every one, I wanted to show what an absolutely brilliant set of books these are! I chose ‘Flashing Fire Engines’ as this has been one of the favourites alongside ‘Dazzling Diggers’!
Each book is written entirely in a clever yet simplistic perfect rhyming style describing a particular vehicle, its constituent parts and what and how it is used– ‘As soon as there’s a fire alarm, the engine starts to roar. The fire-fighters jump aboard – it rumbles out the door’, so making them easy and entertaining reading for parents and memorable for children. The accompanying graphics are bright and colourful and promote great discussions about the characters and their actions.
The final page contains details of ‘Fire Engine Bits’ and includes small images with well thought and written descriptions such as ‘fireproof coats and trousers– these are made from special material that does not burn easily and protects fire-fighters from the fire’– that pre-school children can understand and learn from. This set of books is a great size (similar to that of the Mr Men series) and hence easily transportable when entertainment is required out and about.
Verdict: Absolutely fantastic set of books that I would highly recommend to anyone with a train/digger/fire engine/truck mad pre-schooler, or just anyone who enjoys entertaining children’s books!
Reviewed by Jane