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Sometimes, only the power of dance can save the day. If that dancing happens to be provided by a talking fawn wearing red tap shoes, so much the better!
Daisy Tappytoes Dares to Dance is part of the Magic Animal Friends series, written by Daisy Meadows. Does that name sound familiar? It's the same author (actually, group of authors) who brought us Tasha the Tap Dance Fairy, featured in an earlier book review.
This series follows best friends Lily and Jess. While Lily's parents run an animal hospital out of their barn, the girls are frequently summoned to Friendship Forest, a magical community of talking animals. Grizelda the witch serves as villain for the series, launching all manner of plots and schemes to cause trouble for the residents of Friendship Forest.
My version of the paperback is beautiful! The cover is dusted with shiny gold stars, which is not the case for all editions. This particular series is a UK version featuring British spellings, of course (So many words with an extra u!). Animals and humans alike refer to their mothers as "Mum".
My friend Kynni started summer by breaking her leg. With softball season abruptly cut short, we found time to walk/hop into our favorite local coffee shop for meetings of the Broken Bones Book Club. Daisy Tappytoes was a favorite title for both of us.
WHAT'S IN A NAME?
Character names in this book are delightful! Mr. Cleverfeather is an owl who invents things, Mrs. Buttercream the cow runs Moo Moo Milkshake Hut, and Ellie Featherbill the duckling performs with Daisy in the big show.
Btw, everything is prim and proper with regards to the naming system; adult animals are always referred to as Mr. or Mrs. except for Great Uncle Greybear, the oldest animal in Friendship Forest and Goldie, the cat who leads the girls into the forest. (No Miss or Ms. in this particular book. Are there are no single ladies in the forest?) The child animals are introduced with both first and last names. Villains are referred to by first name only.
HOW TO MAKE AN ENTRANCE
Grizelda the witch consistently appears and exits with a shower of smelly sparks, a spatter of stinking sparks, or some variation on that theme. While I don't recommend this as a regular habit, it certainly makes a statement...
VOCABULARY
Kynni and I came across words and phrases new to us or very rarely used, such as a copse of trees, an animal wearing a waistcoat, and the aviary at the animal hospital.
We also discussed different spellings of words, such as color vs. colour and moldy vs. mouldy.
WHAT ABOUT THE STORY?
Lily and Jess are summoned to the Friendship Forest to watch a musical show being put on by the animals. Daisy's dance performance is interrupted by Grizelda, who steals a magical map of the forest. As Grizelda casts a spell and draws on the map, her awful changes take place for real in the forest. Grizelda releases Puff the wind sprite to carry out the rest of her plan.
The girls set off with Goldie and Daisy to get the map from Puff. They must also obtain special erasers from the rubber tree to get rid of Grizelda's changes before it's too late. Ultimately, dance saves the day! Read the book for details on how.
The Broken Bones Book Club gives Daisy Tappytoes Dares to Dance two crutches up! Give your sense of reality a break and enjoy this fun read if you can find a copy.
TAKEAWAY
Next time you're at clogging practice, remember that the fate of a forest may rest upon your dancing feet. Maybe run through that mountain goat and samantha one more time to be sure...
Charlotte Sandiego and Nellie No claim they can dance just as well as Daisy, but they choose not to for Cat reasons.
Do YOU have a clogging or dance book to suggest for a future review?