A Walk in London

Spending a day going round London can be a great idea for a trip over Half Term.   You can make it as expensive or cheap a day as you like.  Spend a day using your Oyster card on the bus (quite possibly the best way of seeing the sights) stopping off perhaps at a free gallery or museum and finding an open space to eat your sandwiches then you can have a lovely day for very little money.   Use an open top tour bus, go to one of the more expensive tourist attractions and stop for lunch at a restaurant then you’ll still have a good day but it may cost a lot more.

A new book - “A Walk in London” by Salvatore Rubbino, published by Walker Books at £12.99 – would be the perfect introduction before you go.   It’s the story of a little girl’s day going round London with her Mum - the title is a bit misleading as they don’t just walk, they take buses and boats too.   The beautifully produced book is a wonderful combination of story and pictures (Salvatore Rubbino is at least as much an illustrator as a story teller, being shortlisted for the Victoria and Albert Museum Illustration Awards for the brilliant illustrations in his previous book A Walk in New York).   Everything from the paper to the cover to the printing is of the highest quality and gives the book a really luxurious feel.   It’s full of delightful and quirky details in the text, the pictures and not least the little snippets of information about London and its history dotted around the pages.   The crowning glory is a fabulous fold out riverscape illustrating the little girl’s boat trip.   It’s a book to settle down and enjoy before your trip as you plan your day.   It’s hardback and quite bulky and not necessarily easy to carry around with you though you may find the children in your party hard to separate from this lovely book.