Children's Books: Fairies with attitude

Christina Hardyment finds plenty of modern magic in the air with new adventure stories for the 8-12s

Youngest first: having been totally bewitched by Ruby Red: Tales from the Weedwater (Collins, pounds 3.99), I plan to backtrack and acquire everything else Henrietta Branford has written. What's special is her ear for a lilting line, and her sharply original touches - I could die for red brocade skates. Don't be deceived by the outwardly fey look of these tales of a little person flitting about in and out of streams. Ruby is a flower fairy with attitude, full of resource and gumption. She sorts out her warring grandparents, restores a knackered tin horse to his pristine glory and gets out her carpentry tools to build an ingenious swap shop. John Lupton's fine pencil drawings are reticent but delightful allies to the text.

Another classic is Kevin Crossley-Holland's collection, The Young Oxford Book of Folk Tales (Oxford, pounds 12.99). A fine cross-section of stories from all over the world, this anthology reflects how universal are both humanity's values and its humour. But it is also a celebration of the variety of approaches to life, the endless imagination which weaves new threads into ancient cloths of story.

Mark Jefferson has scored a real winner with Hurricane Hamish the Calypso Cricketer (Hippo, pounds 3.99), a high-spirited story of a foundling, washed up on the Trinidad shore wrapped in an MCC towel, who turns out to be a genius at bowling. Real cricketers are introduced to add verisimilitude, but no one could possibly confuse this pacey romp of a book with reality. Pity, really.

Readers need no introduction to the charms of Anne Fine, one of the writers shortlisted for the new Children's Laureateship. She is one of the few writers who offers insights and salves to current childhood angsts without preaching or pessimism. In Goggleyes it was stepfathers, in Mrs Doubtfire absent fathers. In Charm School (Doubleday, pounds 10.99), it is the tyranny of catwalk and beauty contest imagery. The healthily scuffy Bonny finds herself between hell and high water when she has to choose between day schools in handwriting, parenting, driving or charm school, while her mother learns accountancy for a day. But, by the end of her session at Mrs Opalene's Charm School, she has transformed the aspirations of the Little Miss Pretties she encounters and found herself a promising future career as a lighting technician. A chuckle a line.

Another contender for Children's Laureate is Peter Dickinson, most of whose extraordinary books are for older children. But the three haunting stories in Touch and Go (Macmillan, pounds 9.99) form a fine introduction to his writing. In each of them children get confused between reality and possibility, past and present; in touching through time, they also do each other sterling service.

The Key to the Indian (Collins, pounds 9.99) is the fifth in Lynne Reid Banks's hugely popular series of books about Omri and his tiny Indian friend, Little Bull. By now, Omri's father knows the secret of the little doll- like people, and decides to do his bit to solve Little Bull's anxieties about the outcome for his people of the British settlers. But going back in time proves explosive, and Omri's friend Patrick's resentment at being left behind almost proves the undoing of Boone and Ruby. Enough is enough, Omri decides at the end. But few of her followers will want Reid Banks to call a halt to this series of endlessly ingenious adventures.

I am normally a fan of Lesley Howard's books, and Aliens For Dinner (Hodder, pounds 3.99) starts well. Its hero Sinclair has a genius for mental arithmetic and is "the smartest thing in the China House Takeaway since Aunt Ping had dulled her cleaver on too many Peking Ducks". He also has a dangerous hobby of microwaving everything he can think of, a gruesome occupation when he tries miking a goldfish. Either chance or this action gives the microwave powers never previously dreamt of, and Sinclair finds himself in an alien world of the future, soon to be joined by almost everyone else. All this might herald a wonderful yarn. I found it difficult to grasp what was going on: far too many characters are introduced far too quickly, and the plot, larded with buzzword values, is totally lacking in internal logic.

It was a relief to turn to Odo Hirsch's Antonio S and The Mystery of Theodore Guzman (Allen & Unwin, pounds 4.99), a highly unusual little book written with elegant economy. Antonio is the son of a magician and a doctor, who share an ancient house full of secret passages and eccentric tenants. Even at 10, he knows things some people never learn in half a lifetime. But it takes his strange fascination for reclusive Theodore Guzman to make his talent emerge. This is a delicate morality tale about one's purpose in life which is more down to earth than St Exupery's The Little Prince but has something of its clear-eyed wisdom. Don't miss it.

Finally, I can't resist hailing the reissue of another magical and wise adventure: T H White's The Sword in the Stone (Collins Modern Classics, pounds 6.99). Make sure that you don't let your children think the cartoon film is any substitute for this unique version of the childhood of King Arthur. At times a cross between PG Wodehouse and The Water Babies, it is truer to the spirit of Sir Thomas Malory than any other retelling.