Planes Junior Novel

Planes Junior Novel tells the story of the Disney film for 6 year olds, about a crop duster who is frightened of heights and wants to race around the world.

What happens

Dusty Crophopper sprays corn in Propwash Junction, Minnesota. Up and down the same field, day after day. In his head, he's beating two fighter jets to a water tower.

His boss Leadbottom thinks he's got a screw loose. Dottie the mechanic tells him flatly that he isn't built to race, he's built to dust crops. His best friend Chug is completely on board and has given them both call signs. (Dusty races as Strut Jetstream, which was Chug's idea, and Chug is very proud of it.)

Then Dusty scrapes into the Wings Around The Globe Rally because somebody else was caught cheating, and the thing he wanted is suddenly happening.

Here's the good bit. Dusty has a secret and it isn't a small one. He has never flown above a thousand feet. He's a plane who is scared of heights, and he has to say it out loud to a gruff old war plane called Skipper before anyone can help him.

The jokes are pitched squarely at six. Corn fuel that "gives ya gas". A compost spray that Leadbottom savours like fine wine and everyone else finds revolting. Dottie acting out Dusty's fiery crash, complete with an imaginary orphanage, until Chug ends up in tears about the imaginary orphans.

Reading it is quick and loud. Short scenes, lots of talking, a race commentator calling out times to a hundredth of a second. If your reader has seen the film they'll hear the voices. If they haven't, it still opens properly from the first page.

One thing to flag. There's a fair bit of crash humour, including a television countdown of the ten best air crashes of all time that Dusty and Chug watch through their fingers. Nobody gets hurt and it's all played for laughs, but a child who is nervous about flying may not find it funny.

For a child who likes the frights, it's the sort of thing they'll quote at you for a week.

What to read next

If having the story of something they already know on screen is the appeal, there's a Gravity Falls one in the library called Once Upon a Swine. Mabel wins a pig at her great-uncle's extremely dodgy fair, and Dipper starts messing about with time travel to fix a moment he'd rather have back.