Gecko's echo by Lucy Rowland

Ill. by Natasha Rimmington. Bloomsbury, 2017. ISBN 9781408859506
(Age: 4+) Recommended. Animals. Families. Breeding. Rhyming story. Underlining the adage of strength in numbers, mother Gecko in protecting her eggs from the marauding thieves, needs to get help from other geckos in her neighbourhood.
Told in rhyme, the story begins with the mother Gecko waiting for her eggs to hatch, sweeping the area in front of her cave. The next morning a snake slithers by, seeing a gecko and licking his lips at the thought of gecko eggs for breakfast. But Gecko warns him that she has one hundred other geckos inside her cave ready to come to her aid at a shout. He quickly leaves. Similarly an eagle thinks eggs would be a good feed and is told the same thing, flying away. But when a rat calls wanting those eggs, he is not so easily fooled by her threats, and takes a step closer. Children will laugh out loud at the way the mother gecko protects her eggs, and be charmed by her bravery.
Told in rhyming couplets the verse lends itself to children predicting the rhyming word at the end of the couplet, while learning some of the verses will be an easy task. Following the path of the eggs from egg shapes to cracking open to reveal new baby geckos will be a natural way for classes and families to talk about babies, birth and family increase. The illustrations add another level of humour to the tale and counting the one hundred geckos on the middle double page will keep many children amused for quite a while.
Fran Knight