Spid the Spider Adventures
Spid’s children’s adventures are full of giggles and designed to help children aged five to ten years learn to read, grow and succeed in life.
Spid is a lowly spider who loves to write songs and wants to better himself, though he is prone to hilarious mishaps, mainly of his own making. With lots of creative prose, the stories are great fun for parents and teachers to read aloud to, and with, their children, thus helping engage, and fuel a love for books. Each story also includes two songs, with QR codes enabling readers to see and hear animated music videos of the songs.
Written by John Eaton, there are now fourteen Spid the Spider adventures and three albums. The latest story, Spid the Spider Grows a Magic Money Tree shares some characteristics with a famous and enduring English fairy tale. What sets this adventure apart is its unique blend of entertainment combined with a moral and financial responsibility lesson for children aged 4-10 years. In the story, Spid stumbles on what he thinks is a quick way to make money, however, he learns that greed never does anyone any good, and that he should value his lot!
Find out more about Spid the Spider, our growing range of free-to-download and use teaching materials and fun children’s activities.And find his books in our children’s book shop.
The Frograt
The Frograt is an engrossing tale for little ones. It is a debut work by Kiri Eaton. The Frograt is a half-frog, half-rat, and he lives in a swamp with a host of other unusual, yet familiar creatures. As children are drawn into this swamp-set story, they will enjoy the clever repetition and learn a life lesson about greed – one of the seven deadly sins!
Thought-provoking Poetry Books
Sometimes You Say the Strangest Things
A collection of amusing verse, malapropisms and wordplay
Sometimes, You Say the Strangest Things – and John Eaton listens, laughs, and then crafts them into poetry that hits home. In his sixth collection of verse, Eaton presents a collection of poems that blend sharp wit, playful wordplay, and self-deprecating humour to explore life’s quirks and contradictions. Whether he’s taking aim at the absurdities of social media, unravelling mind games, or dissecting the buzzwords of modern life (Fake News or Health and Safety, anyone?), Eaton’s work is a masterclass in clever observation. He pokes fun at authority, modern mores, and the daily grind with a light touch and a wicked grin, transforming the mundane into the magnificent and the ridiculous into the relatable.
Perfect for adults, kids and particularly business folk, You Say the Strangest Things is your ideal pick-me-up—whether you need a laugh, a moment of reflection, a business byword, or just a reminder that sometimes, life really is stranger than fiction. Prepare to smile, think, and maybe even see the world a little differently.
Sometimes You Say the Strangest Thing will be published 20th October 2025.
RRP £8.99
Take That Smile Off Your Face
Ever wondered what happens when life’s absurdities are caught in the crossfire of a clever rhyme? In Take That Smile Off Your Face, John Eaton’s fifth verse collection, you’ll laugh, groan, and ponder as he skewers life’s quirks with his signature blend of wit and whimsy.
From the trials of suntan disasters, motorway cones, mismatched socks, international travel and politics, to the wise words of Mr. Birdie in the sky, Eaton’s poems dig into the human experience with a light touch and a wicked grin. It’s poetry that’s never too serious yet strikes a chord that’ll have you thinking long after you’ve turned the page. It is perfect for anyone who enjoys a laugh and a little life wisdom on the side.
Life is a Rollercoaster
A collection of poems about love, loss, war and peace
Life is a Rollercoaster journeys through the peaks and valleys of the human spirit. This compelling collection of poetry takes you on a whirlwind ride through the depths of love, loss, war, and peace. Each verse is a step on a path of profound reflection, where happiness is celebrated, sadness is confronted, and strength is found in the most unexpected places.
Reflecting human-kind in the raw, John’s poems are powerful, thought-provoking, will stand the test of time and deserve your attention. Some also provide a poetic record of the brutality of the Russian invasion of Ukraine (2022 onwards) fostering a more inclusive understanding of the world.
From the tender moments of love that heal to the heartbreaking realisations of time lost, Life is a Rollercoaster explores the full spectrum of human emotion, capturing the essence of what it means to live, to love, and to endure. Dive into a world where emotions clash and coexist, offering readers a chance to understand, embrace, and even overcome their own complexities.
With poignant lines like:
- “So, if love is the answer, may I ask, ‘what is the question?'”
- “If swans and ducks can live with geese, why can’t we all live in peace?”
Love is in the air
A collection of poems about love and romance
They also say love makes the world go round, and as the world turns on its axis twenty-four hours a day, that means love is all around all of the time.
It is a wonderful feeling to fall in love and be loved back. And I hope that feeling applies to you.
This collection of poems tries to capture the feelings of pleasure, poignancy and pain about love and romance. The poems cover different occasions, places and people:
- Boys loving girls and vice versa
- Parents loving their children and vice versa
- Grandchildren loving their grandparents and vice versa
- Some men also love men, and some women love women
- We also love our pets and very often many of our friends …
Love is something that comes from within and can be sparked by a glance across a room, a friendly word, a caring gesture. Some say by ‘je ne sais quoi’.
The source is for you to know and feel. So as you read this book of love poems, remember that someone loves you.
Some of these poems are also songs. To hear (and see music videos) of some of the songs just scan the accompanying QR codes.
So, relax, read, sometimes listen to, and enjoy these Valentine love thoughts
Order Love is in the air today!
Don’t Forget to Flush
Poems that will drive you clean around the bend
An eclectic collection of poems that will make you laugh, cry and think. John Eaton sees the world through a unique lens. His insights span the world about us, the environment, sport, travel, the human psyche, politics, the animal world, and more. You’ll enjoy his mischievous pen as he challenges self-importance, champions the underdog, and shatters plastic ceilings.
Comprises 116 poems including:
Billly and Benny (the Flowerpot Men-ny), a poem about terracotta friends;
Jackboot and Jillboot – odes to his and hers’ footwear;
And covering subjects that hit the national headlines … such as Barnard Castle:
‘Barnard Castle is the place to be,
A pleasant journey for my family
Where I can quarantine flexibly
To test my eyesight specifically.
…’
And things that are neither here or there …
‘I went to a rendezvous to see Ron Devue.
I thought I had deja vu but jamais vu.’
Order Don’t Forget to Flush now!
Thoughts from a Faraway Place
There are different ways of telling life stories; this book is about my stories in verse with truth and honesty and also with humour and pathos. So much is true to human behaviour, whether it is the cones on the road or thoughts about people’s inability to see their own shortcomings. There is a part of me that finds something humorous in a word or a sentence which leads to a story with a twist, such as in a sentence in the first verse which includes the words ‘blubbaldy-blobaldy-flibadyflob, flibbady-flobbady-boo’, sometimes following a word with another similar word and letting them follow each other until I find an end. Finding words and meaning has been therapeutic tool for me in a time when I needed to say something, even if that something was nothing.
PROETRY
It may not be what you expect, a word that is never used,
a neologism,
with the help of a little entrepreneurialism,
must gain respect, as I suppose,
what I write is not prose,
but it rhymes and chimes like Moet,
though I do not consider myself a poet,
so with pure probity,
I call this work,
‘Proetry’.
Thrilling Crime Books
Murder at Cranborne Abbey
Murder at Cranborne Abbey is a wildly entertaining comedy crime caper that takes you on a rollicking ride through 1990s Devon! It is AJ Butler’s debut novel and due to publish in Summer 2026.
Meet Chipp and Pinn, two down-on-their-luck second hand furniture salesmen, who become private detectives. Chipp is a tough, rebellious lad raised on a council estate, and Pinn, a lonely public-school boy born into wealth. This unlikely duo team up to run a second-hand furniture business that struggles to survive. When a desperate client offers them money to solve a mystery, they embark on a series of bizarre, thrilling, and often comical adventures.
What begins as a simple search for a stolen watch spirals into a series of outrageous escapades involving haunted abbeys, drug dens, government conspiracies, and a plot to overthrow the UK government. Along the way, Chipp and Pinn must dodge corrupt police officers, outsmart spies, and clear their names in a murder mystery where they are the prime suspects
Set against the quirky backdrop of Exeter and Devon in the 1990s, “Murder at Cranborne Abbey” is a genre-bending tale of friendship, intrigue, and laugh-out-loud moments. With a cast of eccentric characters, unexpected twists, and even a soundtrack to accompany the ride, this is a story like no other—a hilarious adventure that’s both nostalgic and refreshingly irreverent.
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