Listen to a story with Oliver Jeffers
During this period of staying at home, children's authors and other organisations are going live in real time to engage children and create a safe place where imaginations are fired. On The Guardian website we have found these great inks to authors reading some of their books
The children’s author and illustrator Oliver Jeffers has started a stay-at-home story time where he reads a book a day . According to Jeffers, “[This is] for all you folks stuck at home in the coming weeks due to Covid, I will be reading one of my books every weekday, and talking about some of the things that went into making it. We are all at home, but none of us are alone. Let’s be bored together.”
His stories are usually about a boy – “Once there was a boy … ” – and the simple sparsity of his language captures your attention immediately, as you know you are in for a good yarn. The books are illustrated in his signature crayon and watercolour style, and full of little visual clues that make them a fun read for all ages. The plots are adult-friendly too, with quirky and often implausible storylines. They have a wicked sense of the bizarre yet are full of humanity.
The boy (and often his penguin or mouse) go on extraordinary yet ordinary adventures, but the real story is in how they deal with feelings.
Many of Oliver Jeffer's stories are on youtube, including one of our favourites, How to Catch a Star.
