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A fantasy quest centres on a girl whose unusual ability to understand dragons may help her find a way to aid someone she loves.

This is a quest fantasy in which music has unusual power and animals’ inner voices matter. Its imaginative conflict is paired with emotionally weighty separations, giving the adventure a tender as well as threatening atmosphere.

Expect a warm family story with humour and emotional depth. Batty’s efforts to earn money, her singing talent and the changing relationships around her provide several strands beyond the central grief.

This is a relationship-focused horse story about returning, reconnecting and recognising that a beloved place or person may not determine someone’s future.

Expect pony-centred children’s fiction with friendship, riding and horse care at its heart. Depending on which Pony Tails volume is intended, the story may focus on training a new pony or on concerns about a pony behaving unusually.

A coming-of-age novel combining stage magic and family strain with serious mental-health, financial and bereavement themes. Ellie’s efforts to help her father create a fast-moving story, while the subject matter can become emotionally heavy.

This volume combines bereavement and strained trust with a supernatural tournament confrontation. Its strongest emphasis appears to be action, escalating power and combat, while the emotional consequences of Genkai’s death remain important.

This is a character-led story about a teenager’s self-image and changing relationships, set alongside Cassie’s disability and her family’s circumstances. Its several viewpoints invite readers to consider how people’s inner lives may differ from what others can see.

A lively story about affection, assumptions and comic cat chaos. It offers a warm intergenerational relationship, visual silliness and a clear opportunity to notice that loving intentions do not replace asking what someone wants.

This is an emotionally direct school-and-family story about being misread, finding ways to communicate and learning to recognise a person beyond appearance or speech. Harriet’s perspective gives disability, irritation, humour and courage a central place.

This is a gentle, practical story about a child whose haircut becomes overwhelming and an adult who responds by listening and changing the environment and routine.

A friendship begins when two boys meet during a beach trip. The story makes room for difference, uncertainty and everyday kindness, alongside questions, frustrations and confusions.

A warm, nature-focused story about belonging and care. Roz learns by observing the island’s animals, while raising Brightbill gives the story a family relationship and a reason to explore migration, instincts and seasonal change.

A warm picture-book story about welcoming a mysterious, vulnerable stranger, forming attachment, experiencing sudden separation and extending hospitality to others like him. Its imaginative setting leaves room to discuss belonging without explaining everything about Mister Toots.

This is an emotionally attentive story about a child whose secluded woodland life is abruptly disrupted. It explores unfamiliar family relationships, different ways of experiencing the world, and the possibility of connection without requiring October to become someone else.

This is a thoughtful survival adventure in which Roz learns by watching, earns trust through helpfulness and cares for an orphaned gosling. Its accessible episodic structure supports shared reading, while the island’s dangers and losses may prompt pauses.

This is an imaginative fantasy adventure about a child pursuing answers about her family in a magical plant world. It offers lively action, inventive world-building and clear conservation themes, while also introducing peril, hostility and loss.

A lively, surreal story about a child’s mounting frustration when a silent penguin will not respond. Comic illustrations, escalating attempts and a sudden lion encounter lead towards communication and friendship.

This offers a gentle but bittersweet story about being lost, misunderstood and welcomed. Its strongest feature is the space it gives children to interpret Beegu’s feelings, experiences and unanswered questions.

This is an animal-centred survival and friendship story, balancing Ratchet’s dangers with Mike’s patient attempt to understand her. It also brings animal behaviour and overlooked urban nature into the foreground.

This is a warm, funny story about a child finding purpose and companionship through an alphabet project with her grandmother and other residents. It balances playful language with the emotional reality of memory loss and a pressured family life.

This is a character-led family story about a child who feels capable when caring for her mother, then faces an unfamiliar arrangement with Aunt Agatha. Its central movement concerns responsibility, control, and the possibility of receiving care.

This is an animal-centred adventure about a herd seeking sustenance, an injured stallion, and a boy whose unusual connection with horses challenges the herd's boundaries.

This is a child-centred mystery involving whale strandings, a potentially endangered baby whale and a foster relationship marked by uncertainty. Its central investigation appears to connect environmental danger with the need to gain trust.