Barbara Else’s pre-teen adventure novel The Travelling Restaurant continues to accumulate honours. It was announced as a finalist in the Esther Glen junior fiction category of the LIANZA Children’s Book Awards, as well as a Best Children’s Book finalist in the PANZ Book Design Awards.
The book has already received a number of other accolades, including an honour award at the 2012 NZ Post Children’s Book Awards and an IBBY Honour for Writing which will be presented in London in August. It was also awarded a White Raven at this year’s Bologna Children’s Book Fair in Italy. The translation rights have been sold in France and Belgium.
The Travelling Restaurant has recently been released in the US where it has been very well received. It had a coveted Starred Review in Kirkus: ‘A heaping plateful of adventure, spiced to perfection with dangers, deft humor and silly bits.’
The Travelling Restaurant tells of the reign of Lady Gall (Provisional Monarch of Fontania) where the word ‘magic’ is forbidden. When 12 year old Jasper Ludlow’s parents flee the city, he gets left behind and finds refuge on the Travelling Restaurant, a sailing ship captained by old Dr Rocket and crewed by feisty Polly. Jasper faces challenges, adventures, storms and hungry pirates. Should he go in search of his parents, or his lost baby sister? Who should he trust? And why is Lady Gall hunting him?