Book Review – Room on the Broom

This book was one of my son’s favorite books when he was 4 or 5 years old. In fact, the book is so much fun that even I enjoyed reading it, as I did many other books by Julia Donaldson. As I have mentioned in some other post as well, books like Room on the Broom, made my son develop a love for books. These were the books that made him realize that reading books (and not just listening to stories) can be a lot of fun and full of entertainment.

Also Read: “Developing the Habit of Reading in Children”

I would recommend all young parents to introduce their children to this book and see for themselves how they will help them develop a love for reading. I say this from personal experience.

Author: Julia Donaldson

Julia Donaldson is an English writer who has written some of the most popular rhyming stories for children including The Gruffalo and The Gruffalo’s child.

Also Read: “Book Review – The Gruffalo and The Gruffalo’s Child”

She has received innumerable awards for her books. Out of the 184 published works, 64 are available in bookshops and remaining 120 were written for school use.

Illustrations: Axel Scheffler

Axel Scheffler is a German illustrator and animator based in London. His illustrations are used in all of Julia Donaldson books and they help in bringing the story to life and in making it even more fun and enjoyable for young readers.

Age range

2-4 years for reading aloud

4-6 years for self-reading (depending on the child’s reading skill)

The Room on the Broom

It is a wonderful picture book with a sense of rhythm and rhyme and of course repetition which makes it easy and fun for young readers to follow along and read. The story itself is interesting with a twist in the end. The illustrations bring the entire story to life and help the young readers get a visual understanding of what is happening in the story.

It is a great book for reading aloud to children aged 2-4 years and for children aged 4-6 to read on their own (depending on the child’s reading skill).

Here is the Amazon link for the book

It is a story about a witch who flies around on her broom with her cat. Over time, a dog, a bird and a frog also join them. The witch, being a nice-hearted witch, cannot say ‘no’ to any of them and takes them all along and the broom eventually breaks with the weight, just when there is dragon in pursuit.

It has a strong set of characters which might be different from the traditional way of looking at those characters. For example – the witch in the story is good, instead of the usual ‘bad witch’. It helps the children’s minds to open up beyond the usual and helps in developing their lateral thinking as well, as they begin to question their beliefs.

Also Read: “Activities to Develop Lateral Thinking”

Apart from the engaging story line, it also teaches important life lessons of friendship, of helping each other and how by working together you can overcome insurmountable odds.

Other books by Julia Donaldson include The Gruffalo, The Gruffalo’s Child, Paper Dolls, Tyrannosaurus Drip and many others.

Here is the Amazon link for a set of 10 books by Julia Donaldson.

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