The No. 1 Car Spotter - Softcover

Atinuke

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1406320773 ISBN 13: 9781406320770

Publisher: Walker Books Ltd, 2010

Synopsis

Oluwalase Babatunde Benson is No. 1. He's the No. 1 car spotter in his village. The No. 1 car spotter in the world!

The start of an exciting new series about the irresistible No. 1, whose hobby is car spotting but who is good at solving all sorts of problems for his village.

When the family's cart breaks down and there's no way of bringing goods to market, it's No. 1 who devises the Toyota Cow-rolla and saves the day. He runs errands for his family and helps Mama Coca-Cola feed the busloads of people who stop for her delicious fried akara. No. 1 even helps Grandmother get to the medical centre when she can't afford treatment.

No. 1 is bright and plucky and resourceful – a fantastic new character in what will undoubtedly prove to be a brilliant series!

About this title

About the Authors

Atinuke was born in Ibadan, in south-west Nigeria. "I remember it as a city of dusty red roads, of bungalows buried under flowers, of botanical gardens. When I was five my father got a "good job" in the capital city of Lagos. A city of polo clubs and swimming pools and slums. We went to live behind the high walls of a mansion in a quiet part of the city, and left our extended family behind. This is where my love affair with books and stories began, locked behind the great iron gates of the lonely house. Throughout my childhood I wanted firstly and desperately to be a Boy, then an Adventurer, and lastly, An Author. Two of these were impossible (I was told) and one was dangerous. Forget it. So I carried on reading instead. I read Enid Blyton books and it sounded fun. At 10 years old, after a campaign of cajoling and persuading, my parents agreed to send me to boarding school in England. And that was, effectively, the end of my childhood. As soon as I could, I gave up all subjects but storybooks and went off to study literature. I wrote 10,000 words one year to get over a lost love and got into Oxford instead. But the writing I had to do there was so dry that I left. I decided to go Adventuring instead. I lived and travelled in England and France, Morocco and Germany and Spain, sleeping like a nomad on beaches and mountainsides. I sang for my supper, painted portraits, weeded gardens, worked as an artist's model and lived in a round mud hut in the wild wet woods of Wales. One day, pregnant with my first son, I told a story to some bored children at a festival and that's when my proper job found me! I haven't stopped telling stories since. I got through the trials and tribulations of life by escaping into books and making up stories in my head. My journal stayed with me through all my adventures, crammed with poetry and reflections and questions. I told stories for a living (because I had been told it was impossible to be An Author - and I had believed them). Until one winter in Wales - too ill to get up and go out and tell stories; too ill to go home to my fatherland - I found myself in the circumstances in which I write best (alone and bored and empty) and I wrote about what I was missing... I wrote Anna Hibiscus."

Author of short stories and illustrator of children's book The King's Shopping and the No. 1 Car Spotter series.

Edition details

• Publisher: Walker Books Ltd
• Publication date: 2010
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1406320773
• ISBN 13: 9781406320770
• Binding: Paperback
• Illustrator: Cadwell Warwick Johnson
• Number of pages: 112