ShortBookandScribes #BookReview – The Christmas Play Rehearsal by Sue Wickstead @JayJayBus @rararesources

I’m so pleased to be reviewing The Christmas Play Rehearsal by Sue Wickstead today. My thanks to Rachel Gilbey from Rachel’s Random Resources for the place on the tour and to the author for kindly providing a copy of the book for review purposes.


It is Christmas time, and the school has been getting ready to perform their Nativity play.

With lines learnt and songs to be sung, it is time for the dress rehearsal. The teacher knows there might be a few problems to sort out, but at least they will know what to improve on or change along the way.

Purchase Links

Amazon

Sue Wickstead’s other books on Amazon

Amazon .co.uk

Amazon .com

A Spooky tale .co

A Spooky tale .com

Jay-Jay the supersonic Bus

Jay-Jay and his Island Adventure – e book

Jay-Jay and his Island Adventure

Jay-Jay and the Carnival

Daisy Daydream the Nursery Rhyme Bus


This is the perfect book to read with school aged children at this time of year. My son is getting ready to take part in his first ever Christmas play. When I first read it the play wasn’t even on the horizon, but the second time it had a much greater relevance and my son really enjoyed the parallels with his own experiences.

The author is a trained teacher so knows exactly what she’s talking about and I think she got it spot on.

It’s a lovely story of a group of schoolchildren learning about the nativity, learning their lines and practising their roles right up to the end of the dress rehearsal. You might think this is a strange place for the story to end, in that you might think the ending would be the first proper performance. But the beauty of this story is that it shows mistakes and all the little problems that need to be ironed out, and so highlights that it’s ok to get it wrong.

The illustrations are perfect, vibrant and fun, and they really enhance the story.

My four year old enjoyed this book a lot and I so did I. It made me smile and made me feel quite glad that I’m not the one trying to organise the play!



I am a teacher and an author and have currently written six children’s picture books with a bus theme.

For over 20 years, alongside my teaching career, I worked with a Children’s Charity, The Bewbush Playbus Association, which led me to write a photographic history book about it.

I soon found that many children had never been on a bus before, let alone a ‘Playbus’ and they wanted to know more. I decided to write a fictional tale about the bus, his number plate JJK261 gave him his name.

‘Jay-Jay the Supersonic Bus,’ came out in print in 2014. It is the story behind the original bus and is his journey from a scrap-yard to being changed into a playbus for children to play in. From Fact to fiction the bus journey continued.

This story has now been followed by five more picture books.

I also undertake events and author bookings and love to share the story. There are also a few more stories in the writing process, with links to real events and buses.

The story has been read in many schools in the south-East of England, where I teach as a cover teacher, it is always well received and certainly different.

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3 Comments

  • Thank you for your review, of the Christmas Play Rehearsal, and I am glad you and your son enjoyed it.
    It’s always a great event in the school calendar and an important one to.
    Not just for the children but the school too, despite all the hard work from the teachers

  • I wonder how many schools and children have got to the end of all the Christmas Rehearsals and performances.
    Hopefully not too many problems on the way.
    but most of all they should feel proud they did it. I was

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