What’s the worst ice cream flavour you can think of?!

The Shop of Impossible Ice Creams

by Shane Hegarty @shanehegarty

Illustrated by Jeff Crowther @jeffcrowther

Published by Hodder Children’s books. 

Published on: 9th June 2022

£6.99

ISBN: 978 1 444 96249 9.

First line: The first thing to know about Limpet was that his favourite ice cream was vanilla.

Genre: comedy, adventure, food

Age: 7+

What’s it all about? The first thing you need to know about this story is that it is all about ice creams! Not just vanilla and mint chocolate chip, but tuna and celery; mushroom and cheese; and carrot and garlic! It is a story that is definitely not middle of the road, but one that slips and slides off the tongue, freezes the brain and delicately tickles the taste buds. Limpet is a boy that worries about everything, and having just moved to a new town with his ice creaming making mum, his evil sister and finding the arch nemesis ice cream maker already living there isn’t helping him to calm down. Throughout the story he meets the kind and the weird and they help him to be brave and enjoy the strangeness that life sometimes throws at you. Such as a wildlife garden on a roundabout, a lucky lemon and a detective chicken. Some wonderful illustrations from Jeff bring the story alive. The second thing to know about Limpet is that he doesn’t like his nickname. The third and last thing to know about him is that everyone calls him that anyway.

Why should I read it? If you read the story you can find out how he got his nickname! The story is great for explaining how we make our own luck, how to be brave in tricky situations and how your perception of something can be very different to the reality if you talk to your friends about it. A funny and engaging read for 7 years and above.