Kids into Books: Jellybean

Author: Tessa Duder

Age: 9-12 years

Publisher: Puffin, $12.95


It continues to sing while Geraldine wanders out to the back garden to sit on the steps with Quaver, stroking his black fur. She hears the boys over the fence begin their regular afternoon game of soccer and the old man next door trying to start his motor mower.

She knows her mother will be furious if he succeeds; she will say she "can't practise with that racket going on." But he gives up after several attempts and she hears instead the squeak of the clothes line being twirled around.

There is a cold wind blowing across the yard, making the clothes on their own line dance about. Men's pyjamas and funny long yellowy underpants, she notices, from the flat in the other half of the house.

She stands up, still holding Quaver, and returns to the living-room - or studio, as her mother calls it - waiting for the music to finish.

*Tomorrow: Inside the studio...