Somewhere You Can Dream

By Janeen Brian &  Hilary Jean Tapper

Reviewed by Margarite Igras

Janeen Brian is a prolific award-winning Australian author and former teacher. Her works include poetry, picture books, junior fiction and non-fiction, and she has even written scripts for Humphrey Bear, the iconic Australian children’s program. Some of her more well-known picture book titles are I’m a Dirty Dinosaur, I’m a hungry Dinosaur, The fix it Princess, Silly Gajah and Are you the Easter bunny?

Her latest picture book, aimed at 3- to 6-year-olds, asks the reader if they had to make a choice where would they go to feel safe and to dream? Award winning illustrator Hilary Jean Tapper’s soft palette and whimsical touch is calming and reflective. The cover, end paper and the 32 pages in between, take the reader to special places and activities to discover.

Do you love shadowy secrets nooks or cosy hideaway?  Do you prefer open spaces that give you room to shout! or wriggling into tiny sites.  Could it be a tree fort, a sheltered rocky bay or just floating on the water. The reader is asked if they have a special place where they can be alone and dream and think a lot.  

With few lines of text on each page, this is a visual collage of children finding their happy place, with choices suggested that could lead to further discussions. The colours are soft and calming, and the children who inhabit the pages are wide-eyed, engaged and aware of their surroundings.

A book that needs to be read out loud, as a bedtime book of just a cosy up book to read.

A & U Children 2026

Janeen Brian

Hilary Jean Tapper