Toad delight by Morris Gleitzman

Penguin, 2016. ISBN 9780143309239
(Age: 8+) Recommended. Toads, Humour, Cooking. A fifth in the Toad series has Limpy wandering the highways saying goodbye to his flattened toad relatives yet again. Squashed by cars and trucks the cane toads have no chance of survival, and Limpy spends his time warning his family of the dangers of lurking there. But his cousin, Goliath is in love, and the object of his passion is a penguin back pack. After the aggrieved family comes to grab their child's backpack from him, things get funnier as Limpy tries his hand at a road side stall to improve the image of the cane toad with humans, and Goliath is taken to the city to be part of a TV cooking show, as one of the ingredients, while brave Limpy cajoles the blue healer into letting him get into the SUV to follow the TV crew to try and save Goliath. Gleitzman's humour is infectious and younger readers will laugh out loud as Limpy tries in vain to help his family. Jokes using words such as bum and poo will tickle their funny bones, and the preposterous idea of a cane toad being the hero of the story has not lost its shine. Readers will hunt out the others in the series (Toad rage, Toad heaven, Toad surprise and Toad away).
With the help of the insects and Goliath, readers will take in the subtle environmental message while Limpy saves the day.
Fran Knight