The Marzipan Pig

Russell Hoban's The Marzipan Pig is a strange, funny and slightly sad little story for 7 year olds about what happens after a sweet rolls behind the sofa.

What happens

Nobody sees the marzipan pig fall. Nobody finds him either. He waits there for months, getting dusty and hard and a bit bitter about it (who wouldn't?). He even practises the speech he'll make when he's rescued.

Then a mouse finds him. And eats him. All of him.

That's where the fun really starts, because the pig's sweetness doesn't just disappear. It passes along. The mouse is suddenly full of longing and falls for the grandfather clock, who will only ever tell her the time. An owl eats the mouse and falls head over heels in love with the glowing meter in a taxi. A bee sips from a flower that tastes of marzipan, gets dizzy and spends a moonlit night dancing for a hibiscus on her very last evening.

It's all joined up like a chain, one creature's feelings handed on to the next. And it's set in a very real London, with the Albert Bridge lit up in the rain and District Line trains rumbling past the common.

The funniest bit is probably the owl. He hoots "Who?" at the taxi driver, snatches a lady's handbag to pay his fare and ends up dancing on the pavement to the driver's trumpet for 10p coins. Then there's the upstairs mouse who stitches herself a party frock out of hibiscus petals!

It's quite a short book and it reads a bit like a fairy tale for grown-ups and children at the same time. The sentences are simple but there's a lot of feeling underneath.

It does have a sad streak, so it's good to be ready. Creatures get eaten, a clock stops for good and a flower droops on her last night. None of it is gory, but a very tender-hearted reader might want a cuddle while you read it together. For a child who likes stories that are a bit odd and make you think, it's a real treat. It's the kind of book they might want to talk about afterwards.

What to read next

If they love the way ordinary things come alive here, try A Necklace of Raindrops by Joan Aiken next. It opens with the North Wind stuck in a holly tree, and the present he gives a baby girl to say thank you.