Maybe... by Chris Haughton

From the first glimpse of three wide-eyed monkeys set against a vivid red background on the front cover, children will be intrigued and want to find out what happens in the story. Opening up the book, the deep purple and blue of the endpapers with animals hiding amongst the foliage further add to the mystery and those three little monkeys beckon the reader and listener on, waiting to see what happens. Mother Monkey goes off after warning the three little monkeys not to go to the mango tree because there are tigers down there. Of course, mangoes are a huge attraction and just maybe . . . the monkeys could look at them.

The delightful narrative just begs to be read aloud, with rhymes and repetition for a young listener to call out and questions to answer. The cheeky little monkeys can't resist the sweetness of the mangoes and readers will have lots of fun finding the tigers that are hiding behind the trees as they clamber down to the ground and are sure to want to scream out to warn them of danger. And they will be laughing at the final pages when they know that the monkeys will not be able to resist bananas.

The print is set in white against tones of bright red, pink, yellow, orange and purple background with the little monkeys in navy blue and other tones of blue, eyes outlined in white making them stand out beautifully. There is a double page spread with just the word TIGERS and three tigers, white teeth gleaming at the cowering monkeys holding mangoes, that is truly memorable, but the reader will be confident that those monkeys are agile enough to get away.

Sure to become a favourite with both children and adults Maybe . . . joins others by Haughton like Goodnight everyone and will grab children's attention with its wit and great illustrations.

Themes: Humour, Monkeys, Cautionary tale.

Pat Pledger