Little Miss Muffet and Other Rhymes
This book is a real treat for us adults as well as children: it’s very attractive, but also interactive and entertaining to keep younger audiences interested, whilst at the same time providing a great, educational tool for teachers.

At the turn of each page, there is a modern, boldly designed and coloured take on a traditional nursery rhyme – from family favourites to first-timers – which will challenge, reward and even surprise children. These rhymes can be played on fingers and toes, sung out loud and looked at again and again.

Significantly, this delightful, wittily, sophisticated collection of graphics is a book for reading together with young children. Likewise it is designed to encourage conversation and visual interaction.
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Wise words
If you find yourself languishing in heavy traffic during your family’s summer getaway, your brood could do a lot worse than crib up on some of the more unusual names bestowed on the fair creatures of our planet, courtesy of the delightful book A drove of bullocks (PatrickGeorge, £9.99). Ever heard of a kaleidoscope of butterflies? How about the loveliness of ladybirds? Who knows, this could be the nugget that clinches it when your child is competing on a future edition of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? And how about creating some of your own monikers? A collection of talkative pensioners alighting from the coach at the services – a chattering, perhaps? And those pesky road cones barring your entry to the outer lane? Surely a battalion.

(Editor’s choice: ‘Reviews’ section ages 5 – 7)

A filth of starlings and A drove of bullocks are charming and informative picture books that introduce the reader to the weird and wonderful group names of animals, insects, birds and aquatic creatures. Everybody has heard of a school of whales but what about a dazzle of zebras or a quiver of cobras?

Each double-page spread illustrates a different animal group with a bold visual pun. A pride of lions is depicted with a yellow rosette that upon closer inspection forms the shape of a lion. These are picture books for a technologically savvy generation. A pod of dolphins is humorously depicted by dolphins listening to iPods.

For every graphic there is a complementary, unobtrusive, bite-size chunk of text providing information about the animal in question. The text gives a few interesting facts that spark curiosity without overwhelming detail. It also plays on the relationship between each animal and its collective noun, highlighting the animal’s personality or habits. In a ‘parliament of owls’ we are told that ‘calling and answering each other across the forest floor, the wise owls debate the issues of the night’.

The vocabulary is often quite sophisticated, however, and words like ‘ubiquitous’ and ‘ostentatious’ may be challenging for some readers. These books are attractive and cleverly presented and there is a lot of fun and discussion to be had trying to interpret the pictures.

Emily McClave

Name check
Fri, 26 Mar 2010 | By Anna Richardson

Oh, the joy of simple graphic representations. When they involve an effortless play on words, quirky typography and a dollop of humour, they are pure pleasure.

Next month, design consultancy PatrickGeorge is publishing What’s in a name?, a collection of graphic interpretations of 100 boys’ and 100 girls’ names.

From Aaron to Will and Angie to Wendy, the names get an illustrative treatment by PatrickGeorge founder Peter Scott. They are revealed in a realignment of their letters, visually represented or just implied – making some enjoyably obvious and others tantalisingly obscure.

“One day I downloaded a list of names and took it from there,” says Scott. “I would work my way methodically down the list looking at the letters rather than the name itself. I wanted to keep it light and would sketch out the first thing that came into my head.” Some of the finished graphics were done in minutes, he explains, while others “kept me occupied for hours”.
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PatrickGeorge have managed the tricky feat of combining a useful addition to the classroom with some sharp wit and excellent illustrations. A filth of starlings and A drove of bullocks are two visually arresting volumes compiling collective nouns for birds and fish and animals…

We had another mention in the UK Literacy Association Spring newsletter for A drove of bullocks and A filth of starlings. In the section entitled ‘Books to support writing’ they say:

“Here are just a few of the many books – new and old – that provide support and ideas for writing for teachers and children….for example you will probably all have Exciting Writing by Jacqueline Harriet and the two wonderful word books ‘A filth of starlings’ and ‘A drove of bullocks’.”

Divergent, playful, innovative, quirky, expansive, are just a handful of the many adjectives that spring to mind after a first perusal of this deceptively simple book of rhymes. Small in format it may be but each of the twenty or so offerings – an eclectic mix of traditional nursery rhymes including ‘Humpty Dumpty’, ‘Little Miss Muffet’ and ‘Baa Baa Black Sheep’, oddities such as ‘Daisy Daisy’, ‘Old Mr Match’ and the infant child-devouring ‘Grizzly Bear’ presented on that small screen, enlarge our perspective of the rhyme obliging the reader to look at it in an entirely new way. Thus “Humpty Dumpty’ is presented merely as T U M P H Y while ‘Pease Pudding’ is three white circles containing red matter, blue matter, and green matter with a spoon strategically angled on the third to become part of the text of the last line.

A fascinating book for all ages especially those with an interest in design and graphics.
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“Just like my first Star Trek film, I couldn’t take my eyes off this book (A filth of starlings). Designed and created by PatrickGeorge this book not only teaches you about animal group names, it also has some beautiful design ideas in every page.”
By Blake Waters, copywriter, KK Outlet.



KK Outlet is a multifunctional office combining a communications agency with a shop and gallery space. It was set up in 2007 by the Amsterdam based communications agency KesselsKramer.

Amanda Craig reviews two children’s books with magical illustrations

A filth of starlings and A drove of bullocks are compilations of animal group names, brilliantly exploited by PatrickGeorge. If you think that these are too sophisticated for a child of 6+, think again. From a parliament of owls, whose eyes are made up of two Big Ben clock faces, to a pod of dolphins (listening to iPods), a school of whales (a schoolmasterly face with a whale’s tail forming moustache and tie), these are stylish, witty visual puns. They are books to read and explain, but the elegance with which each picture is drawn would work on T-shirts or calendars. View article.

A drove of bullocks
A filth of starlings
Written, illustrated, designed and published by PatrickGeorge £9.99 each
ISBN: 978-09562558-0-8
ISBN: 978-09562558-1-5

There is a wonderful, uninhibited, colourful approach to these compilations of collective nouns. Full of charm and wit, the lively pictures are fun for all the family and immensely stimulating for young artists. The text is informative and accessible – some of the group names are very well known, but I’m certain you will enjoy the more fanciful ones. Challenge your Christmas Party guests to identify the illustrations!

This year’s UKLA International Conference theme was ‘Making Connections: Building literate communities in and beyond the classroom’. Our books, which were for sale at the conference bookshop, inspired the following review in the current UKLA newsletter.

“For children (and all teachers of literacy and/art) there were two beautifully produced books about words, images and colours which defy description. A filth of starlings and A drove of bullocks (both published by PatrickGeorge) are well worth seeking out. They could inspire magical language or art work with youngsters as well as being absorbing to read alone or – better still – alongside a friend to share thoughts about each page.”

“Following in the tradition of Lionni, Rand and Chermayeff, these books (A drove of bullocks and A filth of starlings) are finally designed for today’s younger generation and not least
some adults.”

“Collective nouns have always been slightly crazy but two great new books, A filth of starlings and A drove of bullocks take it all a step further. These splendidly designed books are for art departments as well as English departments and should be in every school – yes, secondary too. The stunningly original graphics illustrate collective nouns old and new – I love ‘A flamboyance of flamingos’ and ‘An implausibility of gnus’ and, and… How rare it is to find books that are a joy to browse through, that can be looked at again and again – and if learning there must be, are great for growing vocabulary and creative thinking.”



Wendy is a children’s book author and founder of Bookstart, a national programme which gives free books to every child in the UK. She is also winner of the Eleanor Farjeon award, given in recognition of an individual’s contribution to the world of children’s books. In addition to being an author, editor, and reviewer, Wendy Cooling is a well-known consultant in the field of children’s literacy, and she often appears as a guest on radio and television programmes to discuss children’s literature.

Far too often my phone rings and a voice says ‘I’ve written a book for children and…’ and… and I know it is privately published, or vanity-publisher produced, effort which more often than not is poorly edited, not at all attractively set out and of far less value to the world than in the author’s own estimation. But very occasionally what arrives can be an absolute gem. These two books (A drove of bullocks and A filth of starlings) are wonderful, fresh looking with exemplary design, layout and print and with stunning quality colours. And yes they are ‘privately’ conceived, created and produced, by a husband and wife team with their own group-of-two name of PatrickGeorge. Within both books each double-page spread is devoted to a collective noun for a group of creatures and all are accurate and true however unlikely some might appear at first. Each has a graphic representation of the collective phrase and each of these is brilliant, bold, delightful, clever, funny and very, very witty. Each has a short paragraph of explanation and enlargement on the lower left-hand of the pages with a silhouette of the animal featured. The overall effect is visually highly attractive and so almost impossible to convey in a verbal descriptive piece, hence the illustration to accompany this review.



The few words are very well phrased so that, for example, ‘A litter of kittens’ has these cosy, soft pets ‘purring, kneading and trusting’ with, of course, the middle one of these three, the paw/claw settling movement, pronounced as needing when read aloud. Whilst I could think of so many uses with these books in both primary and secondary schools the main focus has to be on sheer enjoyment, they are such fun! The pair of them make for a real duo of delights, and to cap it all I understand that currently school or school library direct sales are at a cost of £6.99 each. Irresistible – put them near the top of any acquisitions shortlist – buy them.

“Your two books (A drove of bullocks and A filth of starlings) are stunning, gorgeous, and tremendously appealing…the quality of the design and the colour printing is superb. The words for each ‘entry’ are so unusually precise and yet brilliantly expansive in effect. And the whole thing is so witty.”