Don’t Look Now – Falling for It & The Kangapoo Key Ring

Paul Jennings' Don't Look Now brings together two funny stories for 10 year olds about a boy who can fly, but only when absolutely nobody is looking.

What happens

Ricky knows people think he's weird. The kids at school mostly leave him on his own. When his class lies on the grass to spot shapes in the clouds, everyone else sees a duck or a bunny. Ricky sees a wild stallion called Thundercloud (and gets called a weirdo for it).

What he really wants is to fly. Properly, with everyone pointing up and fainting with surprise. His first go, off the roof of Dad's shed, ends in hospital!

Then one day it actually works and he floats above his beanbag. The catch? The second anyone sees him, down he drops. That goes for dogs, cats and cows too, as he finds out the hard way.

In Falling for It he flies down a very deep hole to rescue a little dog. The whole school ends up praising his climbing. Nobody believes the flying bit, and it turns out Ricky isn't the only one at home with a secret.

The Kangapoo Key Ring is even sillier. Mum's most treasured thing is a key ring from Grandad with a piece of kangaroo poo glued on the end. So of course Ricky loses the poo in a puddle one rainy night. His fix involves Blu Tack and the dust from under his bed!

From there it gets properly ridiculous. An owl, a freezing night, no clothes and a field full of cows. You can probably guess what Ricky ends up covered in.

Ricky tells both stories himself, and his worries sit right beside the jokes. He's lonely and he'd love just one person to believe him. Then a page later he's working through which animals could knock him out of the sky (worms are fine, they don't have eyes).

Grandad has already died when the key ring story starts, which is worth knowing if that's close to home. It's gently done and Mum's sadness is mostly about missing him.

If your reader loves a narrator who lands himself in a LOT of trouble, and a plot where poo matters quite a bit, this one's a winner.

What to read next

For another boy whose parents never quite know whether to believe him, try Just Tricking! by Andy Griffiths. Andy wants a day off school so badly that he pretends to be dead, and his dad takes it much more calmly than Andy expected.