Title: Pirate Stew
Author: Neil Gaiman
Illustrator: Chris Riddell
Narrator: Neil Gaiman
Publisher: Bloomsbury UK
Genre: Children’s fiction, Humour
Book format: Audiobook
Sweet Strawberries: 
Description: Meet Long John McRon, ship’s cook…and the most unusual babysitter you’ve ever seen.
Long John has a whole crew of wild pirates in tow, and – for two intrepid children – he’s about to transform a perfectly ordinary evening into a riotous adventure beneath a pirate moon. It’s time to make some pirate stew.
Pirate Stew! Pirate Stew!
Pirate Stew for me and you!
Pirate Stew, Pirate Stew
Eat it and you won’t be blue
You can be a pirate too!
Marvellously silly and gloriously entertaining, this tale of pirates, flying ships, doughnut feasts and some rather magical stew is perfect for all pirates, both young and old. With a deliciously rhyming text from master storyteller Neil Gaiman, this is the audiobook of the year! Joyful, quirky and action-packed, it makes a spectacular and magical gift.
*Free copy provided by publisher for review…
Review: This is a very fun and short audiobook all about what happens when two children get a pirate as a babysitter! ‘Pirate Stew’ is just ten minutes long and is a great and silly story with lots of fun rhyming. The audiobook is narrated by the author and this adds a lot to the overall fun feel of the tale. The story is told from the point of view of one of the two children, a brother and sister who don’t want to be babysat when their parents go out for the evening. But their parents have already arranged for a babysitter, and when he arrives he looks and sounds very interesting.
Long John McRon, the ship’s cook, reassures the parents that he’ll look after the kids, but when the parents have left, more of the pirate crew show up and it leads to lots of strange things happening including the cooking of some pirate stew! This story was so fun to listen to and I can imagine children enjoying listening this story again and again either before bed or at any time really. Most lines of the story rhyme making it easy to enjoy this and also easy to remember. The story is a short one, only ten minutes in length for the whole book, but it’s got a great adventure of the strange night the kids have with the pirates and has a fun little twist at the end too.
Neil Gaiman’s narration is just brilliant! This is the first time I’ve heard him narrating a book and I have to say it really added to the fun of the whole story. The pirates all sound very piratey with lots of “Arrrghs” being heard throughout the story. And I love the added extra “Arrghs” and fun way that the author also reads out the introduction and the details of production, copyright etc.
This is a really entertaining short book which made me laugh out loud in certain parts and I can imagine lots of children will enjoy listening many times. It’s made me want to check out the physical copy of the book too to see the illustrations, but as an audiobook this really is a great one to listen to and one I recommend. 🙂
What do yo uthink of this book? Do you or your children enjoy listening to audiobooks? What about pirate stories? Let me know what you think in the comments below 🙂
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