Olivia Saves The Circus

I bought this book for my daughter Olivia and it is great. Amazing illustrations and nice story.

A beautiful book that will be used in class for fictional writing about the circus. The illustrations are lovely and the text is nice and simple to follow.

Lo compré para una niña llamada Olivia y me sorprendió la calidad del texto y las ilustraciones.Precioso, sensible y bien acabadoTotalmente recomendable.

Another strong addition to the Olivia series. My children prefer the Olivia Forms a Band and Olivia Helps with Christmas, but this title comes in a close third for them.

Reading to your child is great for both of you. Your child will learn new things, become a better reader, and have an increased interest in reading. You will both enjoy a stronger bond as well. Olivia Saves the Circus is a fine book for these purposes.This book is superb for prereaders as well as beginning readers. The wonderful charcoal and gouache illustrations make the story easy to follow and memorize for the nonreader, and provide helpful clues to the words for the new reader. My guess is that while this book will appeal to both girls and boys, very few girls will fail to be charmed by its profile of a very self-confident young lady pig.If you loved Olivia, you will probably be delighted with Olivia Saves the Circus. If you haven't read Olivia, Ian Falconer does a nice job of establishing Olivia's personality in this book's beginning so that you can enjoy Olivia Saves the Circus without having read Olivia. The combination of Ian Falconer's words and illustrations come together to create many subtle effects that many will not notice until the fourth or fifth reading.I think of Olivia as Miss Piggy in a family, and Olivia carries on those qualities again here. Olivia is independent, self-confident, and unfazed by anything.On the inside of the front and back covers, Olivia "walks" the cat by bodily carrying the cat in and out of an area behind two doors, while leaving both doors wide open.In the opening scene, Olivia is making breakfast. "Before school, Olivia likes to make pancakes for her new little brother, William, and her old little brother, Ian." "This is a big help to her mother." The two accompanying illustrations show two happy little boys chowing down . . . and then a kitchen sink area covered with dirty pots and pans with spills everywhere!Next, Olivia gets ready for school, disliking her plain gray plaid and white uniform. "Of course you can always accessorize." And she adds red ribbons to her ears, a red pocketbook, red and white tights and undershirt with the arms showing, a red back pack and a red helmet. Red clothes are strewn all over her room. She heads to school on her little scooter, "Beep, beep -- coming through."This is her day to tell about her summer vacation. Two events happened. "One day my mother took Ian and me to the circus." "But when we got there, all the circus people were out sick with ear infections." "Luckily I knew how to do everything."Olivia is shown riding into the big top on the head of a an elephant leading a string of others. She takes her clothes off and uses a marker to be the Tattooed Lady. She is the Olivia the Lion Tamer, by roaring at the lion and cowing it. Next, she appears as Olivia, the Tight-rope Walker. "And I walked on stilts and juggled and was Olivia the Clown and rode a unicycle."Her biggest event involved being Flying Olivia on the trapeze, who fell to a trampoline (becoming Queen of the Trampoline), bounced up and down, and flew back up onto the trapeze to complete her aerial performance. These six pages are brilliantly combined. You start with the two trapeze pages (numbers one and six in the sequence) facing each other, then when you open the two pages, you will find the connecting four pages (numbers two through five in the sequence) involving the trampoline. Children will go wild for this section!"And that's how I saved the circus, and now I am famous."The summer's second event was less dramatic. "Then one time my dad took me sailing. The End.""Was that true?" was Olivia's teacher's question. "Pretty true." "All true?" "Pretty all true." "Are you sure, Olivia?""To the best of my recollection."Arriving home, Olivia's mother asks her what went on in school that day. "Nothing." (Do you every hear that?)When it's time to go to bed, Olivia isn't sleepy. Her mother cautions her not to jump on the bed, and then catches Olivia doing in mid-air. "Who do you think you are -- Queen of the Trampoline?" "Maybe."As you can see, this book deals with reality and fantasy. To make the separation clearer to the young reader, Olivia is garbed in red whenever real events are occurring and in pink when fantasy is involved.All children should be encouraged to use their imaginations, and this book gives parents a chance to discuss when and where it's appropriate to share fantasies. Certainly, fantasy shouldn't be passed off as reality as Olivia tries to do here. I also liked the way the book shows how Olivia uses the events in her daily life as a springboard for her day dreams. While reading this book together with your child, you can develop a joint fantasy involving some ordinary object or event. You might even enjoy writing your own Olivia story with your child about what Olivia did on another school vacation, building on your child's experiences, interests, and imagination.Olivia has a picture of Ms. Eleanor Roosevelt in her bedroom. Be sure to take some time to introduce Ms. Roosevelt to your child, and to explain why Olivia might admire this great person. What other great people have you told your child about?And that's all, folks . . . to the best of my recollection (I had to put in that little adult humor here about famous peoples' memories under oath).

This was our second Olivia book after the original Olivia. Our 4 year old loves it. The illustrations are wonderful and Olivia is a highly believable small child (even if she is a pig!), The only downside was that the book itself wasn't very well produced. Some of the pages fell out and weren't cut properly. Needed a bit of sticky tape and scissors to put it back together again.

I was a little disappointed with the size of this book. I wasn't expecting it to be as small as it was; the other Olivia books, hardbacked and paperbacked are both much bigger in size. But the story, as usual is great, words are easy for my 6 year old (a keen reader now) to read herself and the illustrations are great. Only wish the book was bigger.

I loved the original Olivia book which was funny and original, as well as being beautifully illustrated. I have not enjoyed subsequent books as much and this one was a bit disappointing - plodding storyline and quite a weak ending. Based on this book, I won't be buying any more books in the Olivia series

Questo personaggio intelligente spiritoso tenace è un ottimo modello per fare crescere i bambini. Scritto in una lingua correttissima e piacevole

Perhaps not ideal for a 15 month old, becuase of the charicature-style drawings (difficult for a small baby to recognise shapes, animals etc) BUT really fun ironic adult humour, like a reward for the parent who is reading:)

Fun book for Olivia lovers.

Un classique à l’humour fin et décaler. Sur le thème des mensonges. Ma fille adore le lire seule ou accompagnée.

Los libros de Olivia no defraudan. A los niños les encantan, y los mayores, disfrutamos con el fino humor de Olivia, y los estupendos dibujos de Ian Falconer. Lo recomiendo sin dudar. Ahora también está en castellano, pero creo que valen la pena en inglés, y les sirve para practicar.