Disclaimer: This product was sent to me free of charge by love2read to be reviewed. However, as per my PR info disclaimer, this review is my unbiased honest opinion of the product.
Product: love2read personalised photo book
Price: £16.99
Age Range: 0+
Manufacturer’s Description: Our carefully designed books combine key words with your photos to bring reading to life for your child. Upload your photos, personalise the text and we’ll print a unique book that will give your child a real head start.
The aim of each unique book is to help your child develop a love of reading. It does this by presenting photographs which reflect your child’s world and relating them to simple words. Research shows that if your child loves books they will learn to read much faster and you will be encouraging a lifelong love of reading. The key words in each book are known as “high frequency ” words, which are some of the first words your child will be taught to recognise when they start school.
Rating: 
(4/5 stars)
Review: I created a “My daddy…” photo book from love2read for James as a Father’s Day gift and I am really pleased with the end result! First impressions were great; the print quality is impressive, the photos look fantastic and the text is really crisp & easy to read.
Both James & Georgie are really pleased with the book too – they read it together straight away and Georgie was absolutely delighted to spot both herself & her Daddy in the photos! Every time she recognised James’s face she gave the book a massive grin, it was so sweet.
I have let Georgie look through it on her own a few times and she really likes flicking through looking at each page in turn. She can be a bit quick when “reading” books because she really enjoys turning the page, but with this book she actually slowed down and looked at each page before flipping over, which was nice to see.
The pages themselves are a tough paper (it’s actually 300gsm card, technically) meaning that we can let her play with it herself with minimum supervision, without worrying about the pages ripping easily. The cover is laminated which protects it from spills, very practical! The book itself measures 17cm x 17cm which is a lovely size for little hands!
The book creation process is fairly easy, although it would have been nice if there was more information on the page about what they recommend for the minimum resolution to be – this info is available on the help page but I think it would be better if it was included on some part of the creation page as well. It will automatically warn you if the photo is below their minimum resolution of 640 x 480, but there is nothing to flag a photo that is below 1024 x 768, which is what they recommend sticking to on the help page.
The inside cover has a really sweet “This book belongs to” page which lets you add in the name of the owner as well as writing a personal message, which is really great for gifts.
You can customise the border colour on each page, as well as the text below each photo - although on most of the books each caption still starts with the “high frequency” words, which creates a wonderfully consistent reading experience & helps your child learn the words quickly.
It would be nice if you could manipulate the photos a bit more by zooming in, as you usually can on most online photo book editors – I had to reupload a few photos after cropping them on my computer to get the composition right.
James says: “I really love this book and think it is a great father’s day gift. The quality is really good, of both the pictures and text. I love the idea of combining a photo book with a story (where I am the star!).”
4 out 5 stars for an attractive, educational product that will be a treasured item on Georgie’s bookshelf for years to come!