Author(s): Nick Butterworth

Children Fiction

A high-speed space-chase unfolds as QPootle5 and his friend, Oopsy, flee from three hungry bladder monsters. QPootle5 is playing hide-and-seek with his friend, Oopsy, when three hungry bladder monsters arrive on the scene. Anxious they might be eaten, QPootle5 and Oopsy fly their spaceships to safety on their huge friend, Planet Dave. Hiding behind Dave's nose, they shake the bladder monsters off their trail. Dave is pleased to have had some visitors -- he's a bit lonely and wishes he was a bigger planet, with moons to dance with. When the coast is clear, QPootle5 and Oopsy head off They stop on an asteroid for lunch, only to find themselves face-to-face with the bladder monsters. But Oopsy confronts the monsters, telling them they are not big enough to be scary. The monsters want to be bigger, so she pumps air into them using the spaceship's lateral stabilising jet. QPootle5 puts the monsters on strings, like balloons, and takes them to Planet Dave, who is delighted. It's not quite as good as having moons, but the monsters-on-strings are better than nothing and you never know, he might be able to teach them to dance.