The Bad Butterfly

Billie B Brown #1

by Sally Rippin

Excellent Book

Genres: Childrens, Chapter Books, 1st Grade, Fiction, Realistic Fiction

48 pages, Paperback

First published September 1, 2009

About the author

Sally Rippin was born in Darwin, but grew up mainly in South-East Asia. As a young adult she lived in China for three years, studying traditional Chinese painting. Sally has over seventy books published, many of them award-winning, including two novels for young adults. Her most recent work includes the highly acclaimed children’s novel Angel Creek and the popular Billie B Brown books, which became the highest selling series for 6-8 year olds in Australia within the first year of their release. Sally is Australia’s highest selling female author and her Billie B Brown books have sold more than 4.5 million copies in 14 languages.
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Sally is a popular presenter in schools and at literary festivals both in Australia and overseas and has a regular program on 3RRR interviewing children’s authors and industry professionals. She is a passionate ambassador for the 100 Story Building creative writing centre for marginalized youth and has mentored many emerging writers and illustrators. Recently, she and her partner co-founded Story Peddlers, a hand-made performance tent that packs away into a custom-built bike, with the aim of bringing back the art of the roving storyteller.

Reviews

[Sean Harding]

What does the B stand for? Brilliant! The first in the series about Billie B Brown, which I am sure I have read before, but anyway, the story is brief and the print is large, with a number of chapters, but it has a real feeling to it, with real emotions and a very likeable main character and her best friend Jack. Parents and other adults are moved into the supporting role, but they play that role well. A very good read, and also a great way to challenge gender stereotypes about who dances, and who is the troll. Good fun.

[Judy]

I can see the appeal to these books, but I'm wondering about the vocabulary, it seems pretty heavy (famous, sprinkles, salami, soccer, dainty). Jack and Billie are definitely not Dick and Jane.

[BlakeWinter]

(read to me by mum)
It was great! And if I was in the ballet class I would be half troll, half butterfly.

[Amelia Mason]

Billie B Brown is very good and exciting. Too much exciting and funny and cool

[Jill Smith]

Billie B Brown and her best friend Jack are starting ballet lessons.

The teacher Miss Dainty tells the girls to move around the room flapping their arms like dainty butterflies. Then she tells the boys to stomp around like trolls, chasing the butterflies. Billie crashes into other girls as they practice, she runs into a mirror and hurts her head. Miss Dainty tells her to rest a while. Jack stays with her and they decide to practice together at home.

The next ballet lesson they surprise the teacher. They swap dances, Jack is a beautiful butterfly and Billie is a great troll.

Sally Rippin writes great stories that kids can relate to. I loved this.

[Chloe (Always Booked)]

I read this because my daughter is wanting to read these books independently so I wanted to pre read. This is a cute story about a girl named Billie and her friend named Jack who are both in a ballet class. The girls are supposed to be butterflies and the boys are supposed to be trolls, but she is a much better troll and he's a better butterfly so they challenge gender norms and switch. Loved it!

[Charlotte Williams]

This book was about Billy B Brown deciding that she wants to become a ballerina, she goes to practice with her best friend Jack. throughout the story they practice, but Billy is not very good. In the end, Billy decides that she will stick to practicing soccer over being a ballerina. I thought it was funny when Billy crashed into the wall being silly, as she tried to be a ballerina. I recommend this book to other kids, because I think it is very funny!

[Laura Weir]

My 5 year old loves this series. It's nice that I don't have to worry about her getting bad ideas from the books (name calling, bad attitudes, scary stuff, etc.). However, she reads these in about ten minutes so I'm glad we can get them from the library instead of having to buy each one. (For reference, she also reads Boxcar Children, American Girl, etc.)

[Pam]

Billie B. can't wait to be a ballerina butterfly, but things don't go well. Her best friend, Jack, tries to help; they discover they are better at the other's role so switch. Dance becomes a lot more fun for each of them. A delightful story for younger elementary level readers.

[evini herzfeld-kinsella]

my cheeky middle child loves these books, we read the together

[Rebecca Oplinger]

Review from a 5 year old: I like Billie B Brown! I think there should be more books from Billie B Brown!

[sophandherbooks]

my cousin gave this to me like 10 yrs ago and I’ve read it a thousand times alr

[Elle]

iconic

[Faith]

I read these books when I was around 10 or 11, and now I'm 20 yrs old. Reliving my childhood through these books is everything to me. Forgotten how much I loved this book

[Denise]

Such a cute book that my granddaughter loves.

[Hazel Avery]

I liked this book because Billie and Jack were such great best friends. They were very supportive to each other and they knew how to have fun.

[Keira McCabe]

Yeah I read classic literature!

[Vanessa]

Billie and Jack learn which parts are most suited in ballet class for their temperament

[Heather]

Cute beginner reader chapter book. Real life situations that connect with children.

[Kendra]

I actually had the pleasure of reading a different book when Ginny was younger from this series. So I of course loved that book so I knew that I needed to get some more of the books and start reading them to Cassie. Because it's important to get her patient ability to be longer when reading books together. As it will be important as she learns to read on her own but also when the books get longer that we read together. This is a short chapter book that an adult can read on their own in a single day. But of course when reading to a two year old you can only read a chapter a day. I love Billie so much in this book. She is every little girl who wants to do it all. She wants to be the girlie girl but she also wants to do the big sports as well. She wants to be who she is and that is totally okay. I loved the illustrations throughout this book. Also Cassie really enjoyed listening to me read it and was excited to find out we had more Billie books.

[Sonya Bright]

An early reader that could work for chapter book readers at the younger age of the spectrum, this first instalment in the Billie B Brown series is fun!

Speaking directly to the reader at the start, we see Billie and her best friend Jack attend ballet class, beginning with the expected behaviours from girls and boys and then quickly challenging gender stereotypes as the story develops. (One thing, though: there IS word for male ballet dancers. I feel like an editor should have picked up on it!)

Cute illustrations help lead to a satisfying end.

[Andy Hickman]

1-Sally Rippin, “Billie B Brown: The Bad Butterfly” (​​Prahran, Victoria, Aust: Hardie Grant Egmont, 2010).
“You didn't think boys could do ballet? Of course they can.” (p5-6)

The 'Billie B Brown' series by Australian author Sally Rippin is a wonderful set of books helping young kids acknowledge and deal with their range of emotions that arise from various childhood predicaments. These books reinforce the positive outcome of good decision making.

[Alexis Munk]

I think these books are great for second and third graders who are transitioning into long chapter books. The font is really big so there are not very many words on each page. The words are not very difficult either. I really like how this book shows children not to give up. Even though Billie isn't the best dancer, she practices all week to become better. It shows that practice and hard work really pays off.

[Margaret Gardner]

A young patron recommended this series to me today. I love having the option of a chapter book with LARGE text, fairly easy vocabulary, and pictures. Plus this title in particular expressed that gender roles don't need to be set in stone (Billie might not be a ballerina afterall). I'll keep this in mind for other emerging readers.

[Megan]

Billie B. Brown and Jack really wanted to be famous ballerinas, but Billie got hurt so the next ballet class Jack was the ballerina and Billie was the stomper. Billie bumped into the piano and she got hurt so that's when she decided she did not want to be a ballerina. She wanted to do soccer instead.

I like being a ballerina and playing soccer like Billie.

[Amy]

This was a good enough book for what it is. It is clearly meant for very young readers to read on their own, a good introduction to chapter books. It wasn't the best read-aloud book, but the girls liked it, and it didn't annoy the crap out of me like some of the books I read to them.

[Ruth]

A quick easy read for beginning chapter book readers. Billie isn't your typical tidy graceful girl that you imagine as a ballerina. Cute book shares strengths and weaknesses of boys and girls. It's ok to be different.

[Elena P]

It was ok. People sometimes want to compare themselves to others, but I don't think that's fair to compare you're self to others because some people have talents that they just get so you can't really compare them to you.

[Macy]

Very short but good to read if your not so good

[Kimberly MacCee]

These are a much quicker read than Junie B Jones, and H really seemed to enjoy it!