The Dinosaur’s Diary

Julia Donaldson's The Dinosaur's Diary is a funny animal adventure for 6 year olds, told by a little dinosaur who tumbles through a puddle and ends up on a farm where nobody has ever seen a dinosaur.

What happens

Hypsilophodon (H for short) is small, speedy and fed up. Everyone else seems to have armour or horns or a big club on the end of their tail. All she's got is two little spikes on her thumbs. And her eggs keep getting eaten.

So when a Megalosaurus chases her into a deep puddle, she's sure that's the end of her. Instead she bobs up in a duck pond, next to two very cross "Quackosaurs".

What follows is a lovely fish-out-of-water story. H runs away from a tractor, which she decides must be a "Tractosaurus". She wonders if farmers hunt for eggs in gangs. A cheeky swallow called Swinburne helps her find a safe spot, and she lays thirteen green spotty eggs inside an old broken tractor in the barn.

It's all written as H's diary, which makes it great for reading aloud. Back home the days are named after dinosaurs (Tri-Day, Euph-Day, Comp-Day). On the farm she can't understand why they're named after the sun and the moon. Little readers get to be in on the joke, because they know what a cat or a tractor is and H doesn't!

The babies are the best bit. Henrietta is bossy, clever and completely obsessed with the farmer's big red tractor. Little Horace is small and slow. Can you guess which one gets into trouble, and which one comes up with a plan to help?

There's a sad bit right at the start that's good to know about. H's first eggs get eaten by other dinosaurs, and later a cat grabs a baby swallow (H charges in and saves it). For most six-year-olds that's just part of the adventure, and the story is warm and funny from there.

What to read next

If this one goes down well, Julia Donaldson's Princess Mirror-Belle is another funny story with a big imagination. Ellen is stuck at home with chicken pox when her reflection climbs out of the bathroom mirror and announces she's a princess.