Donkey’s Kite

The three horses Jack, Max, Lax and their friend Donkey are back!

In Horse Valley, it’s a perfect day to go kite flying. Jack, Max, Lax, and Donkey decide to get creative by putting together their own homemade kites. However, Donkey’s kite doesn’t work. No matter how hard he tries to get it to fly, it just keeps tumbling to the ground. How will poor Donkey get his kite to fly? A friendly goose named Gusty is delighted to help him out.

In this Horse Valley Adventure, Donkey learns not to give up when all seems hopeless. The friends all learn a lesson about helping others and true friendship.

* * * Review * * *

Donkey’s Kite is the second book in the Horse Valley Adventure and just as cute as The Three Horses and the Big Bully Donkey.

Lax, Max, and Jack haven’t changed much since the first story which is a little unfortunate, but changes do not happen overnight.

Donkey, however, has really changed and is now best friends with the three brothers.

I felt Donkey had a bit of a self esteem issue thinking his kite wasn’t good enough and that he isn’t good at things. Unfortunately, he also got a taste of his own medicine when some geese starting bullying him.

What I really liked it that Gutsy reminds me of the Ugly Duckling. She has been bullied before and knows what it feels like so she defends Donkey and helps him.

In the end, the three horses, Donkey, and Gutsy all become friends and build a kite together so that no one is left out and that they all have a kite that is fabulous rather than each bragging about their own kite and making others feel bad.

Again, I think this is a great book that children can take away a lesson from.

I would say this is around the 3rd grade reading level, but would definitely recommend to parents and teachers to read to their kids. The kids will love the illustrations and the lessons are valuable!

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About the Author

Liana-Melissa Allen is a young author and illustrator of children’s books and books for youth. She has written, illustrated and published six books. Her most recent one is the colorfully illustrated children’s book “Donkey’s Kite”, the second book of “A Horse Valley Adventure” series. The first was “The Three Little Horses and the Big Bully Donkey”. The lovable cartoon characters, Max, Lax, Jack and Donkey makes them a favorite of first and second grade students. She is now working on her third book of “A Horse Valley Adventure”.

The magical world of fantasy has inspired Liana’s imagination since as long as she can remember. Part of this was fueled by her dad reading aloud to her every day when she was younger. As a result, reading is her primary passion along with music. These two passions feed her imagination into stories and drawings, which she joyously sketches out into storyboards for a potential book.

Liana-Melissa is also a dedicated classical/jazz pianist, and mostly enjoys older music, especially from the big band era and the 1940’s, 50’s and 60’s. While playing the piano, her imagination often leads to a great amount of improvising. Frequently, Liana will improvise a theme for one of the stories she is writing. Capturing this improvised music became a priority, which ultimately resulted in theme music for “A Horse Valley Adventure”. The “Horse Valley” theme will be used for a short animated video featuring her Horse Valley characters.

Liana-Melissa loves to hear from her young readers. Please visit her website at www.lmabooks.com for more information, and to contact her by email. Visit her on Facebook too.

You can purchase the book at… Amazon.com Barnes & Noble