It’s the Year of the Rabbit and in honour of this occasion I’ve chosen some of my favourite rabbit books:
Bunnicula by James Howe.
When the Monroe family go to see the movie “Dracula” they find a rabbit with strange black and white markings. They bring him home and give him the name Bunnicula. This story is narrated by Harold the family’s dog and the other key player is Chester, a cat with literary leanings (he is named after the famous author CK Chesterton). Harold thinks Chester needs to stop reading scary books after dark but Chester believes that Bunnicula is a vampire rabbit!!!
This is a funny book and if you have enjoyed Dick King Smith’s books like Babe/Sheepig and Michael Bond’s books like Olga Da Polga or Beverley Clearly’s Ralph S. Mouse series, Margery Sharp’s Miss Bianca series or Vlad the Drac or Ruth Park’s Muddle-Headed Wombat series you will love this book!
If you have already read Bunnicula you may not be aware (I wasn’t for 16 years!) that there are more books in the series: The Celery Stalks at Midnight and Nighty Nightmare and Return to Howliday Inn
Watership Down by Richard Adams
It is time I re-read this book but it made an impression on me when I was a kid. My mother read it to me and my three brothers when we were 10, 8 and 6. She said it was terrible, because whenever she read it we would all be crying because it was sad, or hiding behind the couch because something terrible was about to happen, and she would say “why don’t we stop, why don’t we read something else?” but we wouldn’t let her because we wanted to know what happened next.
I don’t remember a lot about the book except that the rabbits are going on a long journey and are trying to escape a disease that is killing rabbits. There is a lot in the books telling you about rabbit language and lore.
From what I remember if you like long, exciting, adventure, animal, sad stories this may be the book for you.
The Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams Bianco
What does it take for toys to become real? This is a story of a toy bunny who longs to become “real” although he doesn’t know quite what “real” means except that it involves in losing most of his whiskers and fur and could be quite painful. This is an illustrated story shorter than a chapter book longer than a picture book and though it makes me cry it has a happy ending. (though Kilbirnie Bookbusters said it didn’t make them cry so maybe I’m a woss!)
I think if you like fairytales and stories like The Happy Prince by Oscar Wilde and Hans Christian Anderson’s The Little Match Girl you would like this book.
Let’s Make Rabbits by Leo Lionni
This is a picture book by they same author/illustrator who wrote Little Blue and Little Yellow. Pencil and Scissors decide to “make rabbits” so they each draw and collage a rabbit. The rabbits get hungry and scissors and pencil are no where to be found. What will happen when the rabbits eat a “real” carrot. This has beautifully simple illustrations.
This is also a fun book to share with little brothers and sisters.
You may be inspired to make your own rabbits after reading this story but make sure they have plenty to eat.
There are 30 rabbits hiding in Miramar and Kilbirnie library so when you’re in see how many you can find some are very cunningly hidden!!