I am so hoping you will a find a copy of this glorious book and get reading – whatever the weather patterns are like outside. You think (and feel!) about the damaged planet, about threatened wildlife, about what it is to be brave and stand up for what you believe in, about a young girl whose father is too too busy to spend much time with her. And that is exactly what The Last Bear does. That is the delight and warm glow of reading and letting it unfold for yourself.Īll good books make you feel and make you think. And that is the story I am not sharing and spoiling for you. April has to dig deep into herself to decide what to do next. A real live polar bear who is hungry and lonely and wounded. It is not ruining the story to say that after days of looking she discovers it is indeed a real live polar bear. One day, against all odds, against everything it says in the books, April is sure she spots a polar bear in the distance. Her father says she is just like her mother and the best word for them is a Norwegian word: Friluftsliv finding joy in the great outdoors. She gets to go exploring out in the wild and the cold of an arctic island for a whole summer. All her hopes of more father time are squashed because her father seems to work even harder studying the weather patterns. One day April’s father gets a job on an island in the Arctic Circle for six months, and she gets to go too. She spends most of her time in the back garden where a family of foxes offer endless fascination. He works very very hard and keeps odd unpredictable hours. Her dad is a scientist studying weather patterns.

She lives in a house with her father: ‘It was tall and thin and looked ever so slightly unhappy around the edges, and inside it always felt cold’. A perfect match for the story.Īpril Wood’s mum died when she was four. Winner of the Kate Greenaway Medal, Levi Pinfold’s illustrations are exquisite as you can see by the cover. The sentences are crafted so very beautifully, but the memorable beauty lies in human behaviour: friendship, compassion, caring, determination, inventiveness. Hannah Gold’s debut junior novel is a treat.

What a delicious book to read on a gloomy Sunday with nowhere to go but into the warm glow of a story.

The last bear hannah gold review