At Christmas, it can often be a struggle to encourage those learning to read to keep at it during the school holidays, particularly if they are not fond of school readers.  You might find, however, that these books help.  The North Police series has been aligned to the book-banded system: the books are marked as ‘gold’ level, but to me, they are on the easier side of the spectrum, so check out the text in the photos first.

There are 4 books in total, each around 30 pages long and broken down into 3 chapters.  Detectives Sprinkles and Sugarplum (a girl and a boy) are experiencing a very busy Christmas: someone has taken Santa’s sleigh without asking and now it has a huge scratch in it; one of the North Police’s greatest detectives is missing in action; a reindeer is injured and no-one will own up; and Santa’s computer has been destroyed!  All cases for Sprinkles and Sugarplum to investigate and clear.  The stories are entertaining – with clues as to the culprit given out along the way – and are supported with full-colour illustrations.

All the books have been tested by my son, who constantly rebels against what he calls ‘boring’ school readers, and he loves them.  He whizzed through them and now takes them to his room at night to re-read before bedtime.  His only complaint is that there are only 4 in the series and he would like more!  Scott – if you are reading this – please get a shufty on…


The North Police Series
Author: Scott Sonneborn
Illustrator: Omar Lozano
Publisher: Raintree

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