Books published by publisher Jonathan Cape, London

A little creature, pretty as can be, arrives one day at George and Bella's happy home. Its name is Zagazoo. The Zagazoo is, truth be told, not perfect, yet his little smile brings the couple joy. But Zagazoo never stays the same for long. In time, the little darling becomes a screeching vulture (whose cries are especially piercing at night), then an accident-prone elephant, and later a mud-loving warthog. On it goes, until, finally, Zagazoo is transformed into the most surprising creature of all!! Renowned for his exceptional picture books, Quentin Blake offers his own zany take on the stages of childhood in this story that all Zagazoos, current and former, will relish. Quentin Blake is one of the most popular children's book illustrators of our time.

Physical description; 255 p. ; 20 cm. Notes; Case bound in black cloth. Japanese characters embossed on upper cover in gold ; title on spine in silver. Decorated endpapers. Jacket design by Richard Chopping. "Printed ... on paper made by John Dickinson and Co., Ltd. Bound by A. W. Bain and Co., Ltd., London" -- t.p. verso. 'First published 1964' (colophon) but it was actually published in late 1963. Subjects; Bond, James (Fictitious character) - Fiction. Intelligence service - Great Britain - Fiction. Espionage & spy thriller.

For seventeen years, as part of his daily writerly routine, the author and naturalist Mark Cocker has taken a two-mile walk down to the river from his cottage on the edge of the Norfolk Broads National Park. Over the course of those 10,000 daily paces he has learnt the art of patience to observe a butterfly, a bird, flower, bee, deer, otter or fly and to take pleasure in all the other inhabitants of his parish, no matter how seemingly insignificant. In turn these encounters have then been converted into literary epiphanies that are now a widely celebrated part of his work. In A Claxton Diary he has gathered some of the finest short essays that he has ever written on wildlife. They range over almost everything he can see, touch or smell, from the minute to the cosmic, from a strange micromoth called yellow-barred longhorn to that fiercest of winter storms the so-called ‘Beast from the East’.Here also are blackbirds at their dawn chorus, or owls ghosting down the dykes at last light. Here are unwedded queen ants pouring out of the pavement cracks for their nuptial flights, or a garden cross spider spraying a bumblebee with jets of silk that are, gram for gram, stronger than tensile steel. From the marvellous to the macabre, Cocker tries to capture nature without flinching and in its entirety. In so doing he provides us with a vision of an English country parish that for intimacy and precise detail is comparable with Gilbert White’s diary on Selbourne. Above all he reminds us that we are all just members of one miraculous family, fashioned from sunlight and the dust from old stars.

One of The Observer's Best Children's Books of 2018! 'It's a great story for everyone, especially those not used to seeing themselves centre-stage'- The Guardian 'A refreshing picture book star' - The Observer From the author of Bumblebear, comes a new hero for our times. Introducing: Billy! Whilst on a lovely walk in the woods, Billy and her trusty sidekick Fatcat hear a terrible rumble… a terrible rumble coming from a Terrible Beast… He’s making a Terrible Soup out of all of Billy and Fatcat’s friends! Luckily, our brave heroine Billy has a trick or two up her sleeve (or in her hair)…Join Billy on her mission to defeat the Terrible Beast (and save those adorable little bunny rabbits too).