- Picture Books
- Ages 4–8
- Everyday Life
Colette's Lost Pet
Book 1 of 4 in Mile End KidsView the full series
Part of the Mile End universeOpen the collection
New to the neighbourhood, Colette invents a runaway pet parakeet to make friends, and her little fib grows into a wonderful, whole-block adventure.
- Best for4–8
- FormatPicture
- Length48 pp
- Read aloud~10 min
The vibe
What it’s like.
Style
- Conversational
Tone
- Warm
- Funny
- Whimsical
- Gentle
Themes
Experience meters
What’s it about?
The story.
Colette's family has just moved to Montreal's Mile End, and when her mother says "For the last time, NO PET," and sends her outside, Colette meets a boy her own age and, in a flash of inspiration, tells him she is searching for her lost parakeet, Marie-Antoinette. There is no parakeet, of course, but the story is far too good to give up: as more children join the hunt, Colette spins Marie-Antoinette taller and grander, until the bird has flown her to Paris, Japan, the desert and the sea. Soon the whole neighbourhood is caught up in the search. Isabelle Arsenault tells this first Mile End Kids story in hand-lettered comic-book panels wrapped in a picture-book jacket, her limited palette of blues and yellows glowing against soft grey streets. It is a warm, funny, quietly knowing tale about how a small untruth, and a big imagination, can be exactly what it takes to make a friend in a brand-new place.
Fit check
Right for your child?
Where it lands by age
Best shared with 4-7s, who will relish being in on Colette's growing fib; confident readers of 6-8 can follow the comic-panel layout themselves.
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- Best fit · 4–8
- Read aloud · 4–8
- Independent · 6–8
Prose load
Light
Visual support
Very high
Reluctant-reader friendly
Very
Read-aloud quality
Strong
Works well for
- Reading aloud
- Bedtime
- Reading together
- Gift-buying
- Reluctant readers
Nothing in the book is likely to concern most parents. Safe to recommend without preview.
Bedtime suitability
4 / 5 · Bedtime-friendly
Sensitive-child
5 / 5 · Good fit
Graphic intensity
1 / 5 · None
Best for
- Making friends
- Moving house
- Imaginative play
- Beautiful illustrations
- Read aloud
Avoid if
- Wants action adventure
- Prefers simple text
Particularly good for children who are…
- Making friends
- Moving house
In the classroom
How it works in school.
A rich EYFS/KS1 read-aloud for talking about honesty, imagination and settling into a new place, and its comic-strip storytelling invites lovely work on inference and character motivation.
A book children love that happens to support school — never a stand-in for the texts a class is taught with.
Why it lands
Why they love it.
Why kids love it
Colette's ever-growing tale of her amazing runaway parakeet is delicious to be in on, and the way the whole street joins her make-believe hunt turns a small lie into a shared game everyone wants to play.
- Friendship and belonging
- Trickery and cleverness
- Adventure and freedom
Why parents love it
A gently knowing story about the fibs children tell to connect, told in Isabelle Arsenault's exquisite hand-lettered panels. A lovely conversation-starter about honesty, imagination and the awkward art of belonging somewhere new.
- Beautiful illustrations
- Indie gem discovery
- Conversation starter
In the series
Mile End Kids.
4 books · open the series →
About the author & illustrator
Isabelle Arsenault.
If you liked this
Three ways out of this book.
If you liked this, try…
Lateral matches. Same shelf, different texture.
Where to go next…
Escalation reads — a step up in scale, silliness, or stakes.
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Books that share themes and topics with this one.
