Last week on the books blog, Alison Flood confessed how easily books to read aloud set her weeping. But parental tears aren't the only problem when sharing books with the tinies: preschooler bedtime stories necessitate a lot of repetition, making a one-trick Scheherazade of every whey-faced, knackered parent. Sometimes, there's barely a moment to draw breath before the bath-fragrant little tyrant utters an imperious: "Again."
This is not too crushing if the book is an adult's favourite too – perhaps a hand-me-down copy, bearing one's own ancient crayon scribbles in the flyleaf – but some stories invariably induce a sense of rebellious dread. At bedtime, my limp-wristed wish to respect my child's choices is at perpetual low-grade war with my urge to leap in with a falsely bright, "How about this one?"
TV tie-ins are generally a recipe for dullness, cooked up by gleeful sadists who've never had to read them aloud. The Octonauts books – text-dense and full of unpronounceable names – are top of the pile I am always trying to mislay. Dora books make me paranoid about my terrible Spanish accent, and Thomas the Tank Engine is full of the Rev Awdry's stifling moralism: be a Really Useful Engine, or it's off to the smelter's yard with you. Their patriarchal smugness also annoys me – Sir Topham Hatt, aka the Fat Controller, is in charge of everything, and the Duke of Boxford strolls around in boater and blazer, probably subjugating the proletariat when he isn't day-tripping on his own private train.
So I often indulge in a bit of pre-bedtime bookshelf shuffling, displaying more favoured titles temptingly to the fore. I'll happily reread my old friends the Ahlbergs – Each Peach Pear Plum, Burglar Bill and the rest – for hours, especially now I've perfected a truly villainous accent for nefarious Billy, modelled on Oliver Reed's Bill Sykes ("Thass a nice tin of beans … I'll 'ave that."). Classic animals such as Spot, Mog and Gorilla usually please us both, as do the apple-cheeked adventures of Alfie and Annie Rose.
More contemporary picture books I can bear rereading on a nightly basis include Oliver Jeffers' The Day the Crayons Quit (although having to come up with a different voice for each of the 12 crayons, on pain of trenchant three-year-old criticism, is somewhat taxing). I also like anything by Polly Dunbar – her few yet eloquent words leave her warm and tender pictures to do the talking, sparing my vocal chords. The sparse, sinister watercolour richness of Tomi Ungerer's Fog Island is weirdly, transportingly addictive. And Maisy Mouse – a jaunty, competent little rodent who can drive a bus, bake gingerbread and go on holiday all by herself – packs a great deal of narrative satisfaction into mercifully brief stories.
Which books are you willing to read over and over, and which ones do you sneakily shove down the back of the shelf?
