I’m Going to Eat This Ant by Chris Naylor-Ballesteros

We are always on the look out for children’s literary events and author appearances so when we heard that Chris Naylor-Ballesteros would be reading his first picture book, I’m Going to Eat This Ant at the Little Ripon Bookshop we went along to listen.

Published by Bloomsbury, this is the story of an anteater who is looking for a bit more variety in his diet of ants. But just what is the perfect accompaniment to a wriggly little ant? In a sandwich? Stir fried? Or squished into a sausage? The anteater shouldn’t take too long thinking about his meal though or those sneaky, clever ants might just have other ideas.

Minimalist and humourus illustrations are sure to make little ones laugh as they spot the ant being squeezed into the next dish.

A perfect book to read aloud with the sound ‘s’ repeated throughout the story and cleverly played on at the end.

Imaginative and with a good helping of silliness this is an excellent debut picture book and we’re looking forward to reading more of Chris’s work in the future.

At the Little Ripon Bookshop Chris had been busy most of the day painting a wonderful image from the book on the shop window…

And after he’d finished it was time for a very special story time.

Chris read the story to a packed room of little ones and the entertained them with his funny drawings of ants hiding in their favourite foods.

Next it was time for the children to get drawing and create their own anteater picture. Here’s my one-year-old’s effort…

We really enjoyed the way Chris enhanced the story by encouraging the children to make the sounds or copy actions for the different foods. His drawings at the end were a great way to fire imaginations and get the children thinking of different ways to squidge an ant into different foods. A trickier challenge could be to think of more foods that begin with ‘s’ or foods that all start with another letter.

If you are regulars to the story time at this gorgeous little bookshop then you’ll know that they always end with a biscuit to match the theme of the book. Of course this story time was no exception and helped all the children to decide that the best way to eat and ant is iced on a biscuit!

Thank you to Chris for sharing your story with us and to the Little Ripon Bookshop, as welcoming and enthusiastic as ever. We loved this little ant display too…

You can find out more about Chris Naylor-Ballesteros on his website here.

The activity pack to go with the book is available to download from the Bloomsbury website here.

Buy I’m Going to Eat This Ant from Wordery.

Follow @Acornbooks

This post contains affiliate links that won’t change the way you shop but might make us a little bit of money… that we will probably spend on more books.