The Three Little Wolves and the Big Bad Pig

The Bibliography
Trivizas, Eugene. 1993. The Three Little Wolves and the Big Bad Pig. Ill. by Helen Oxenbury. New York: Macmillan Publishing Company. ISBN 0689505698

The Plot
The three little wolves leave their mother's house to live on their own, but before they go, Mother warns them to be wary of the Big Bad Pig. They build a house of bricks, but the Big Bad Pig knocks it down with a sledgehammer after attempting to knock it down by huffing and puffing. After a narrow escape, they build another house of concrete. The Big Bad Pig comes around again, huffs and puffs to no avail, and destroys the house with his pneumatic drill. The wolves escape again, this time building a house of barbed wire, iron bars, armor plates, heavy metal padlocks, Plexiglas and reinforced steel chains. The Big Bad Pig strolls up, huffs and puffs and blows the house up with dynamite. The wolves finally decide to build a house of flowers, which the pig begins to huff and puff and do something else awful to, but stops to enjoy the scent of the flowers. He realizes because of the beautiful smell of flowers that he's been a big bad pig but wants to be a big good pig instead. He sings and dances, then he and the wolves play games, become friends, and live happily ever after.

The Analysis
Normally I would never say that a children's book is awful, but in my opinion, this book is AWFUL. Yes, it warrants bolding and redding. I would never read it to a group of children. The story is just bad. No kid knows what a pneumatic drill is. If they didn't have the illustrations of Helen Oxenbury to look at (which is this book's only redeeming quality ... great illustrations, nice watercolor), they'd have no idea what was going on. What is with the repeated quote, "By the hair on our chinny-chin-chins, we will not let you in, not for all the tea leaves in our china teapot"? Are they offering the pig the tea leaves? That doesn't make sense. Are they expecting the pig to give them tea leaves? No, because they already have them. I don't get it. Oh, and the little wolves didn't build a house out of barbed wire, iron bars, armor plates, heavy metal padlocks, Plexiglas and reinforced steel chains, that was a prison. Why didn't the story just end there with the little wolves locking the pig up in their terrifying jailhouse? Not only is the story bad, but there are way too many words per page, which is not conducive to storytime sharing. I suppose the ending is sweet, with the pig becoming tender-hearted and friendly with the wolves, but that's not good enough to turn it around in my eyes.

The Review
Kirkus (Kirkus Reviews, 1993)
Never mind the other incarnations of this tale--classic, fractured, rapped; this inversion will have children giggling from the outset. Sent into the world by a mother who wears hair curlers, three "cuddly" wolves build a brick house, then try to fend off a snarling thug of a pig who demolishes it with a sledgehammer. Their next place is concrete; the pig has a pneumatic drill. They construct a metal fortress, complete with steel chains and Plexiglas; the pig goes for dynamite. Then they build a house of flowers and the pig pulls a "Ferdinand," not only reforming but making it a happy m‚nage ... quatre. This latter-day plea for a peaceable kingdom reckons once and for all with the question at the core of this familiar tale--why must pigs and wolves be enemies? Oxenbury provides dauntingly well-executed watercolors, offering such charming contrasts as an angular modernistic concrete home in an otherwise pastoral setting.

The Connection
If, for all the tea leaves in my little china teapot, I was forced to use this story in a program, I'd use it in conjunction with other fractured and non fractured versions of The Three Little Pigs, like an original telling of it by Joseph Jacobs, The True Story of the Three Little Pigs by Jon Scieszka, The Three Swingin' Pigs by Vicky Rubin, and maybe a puppet show version from the book One Person Puppetry Streamlined and Simplified by Yvonne Amar Frey called "Wolfi and the Three Squealers," and have my kids write their own versions of the story. I really can't see myself using this version though. Maybe I'll just do this program MINUS this book.

Rumpelstiltskin

The Bibliography
Zelinsky, Paul. 1986. Rumpelstiltskin. New York: Dutton Children's Books. ISBN 0525442653

The Plot
The poor miller in town gains favor with the king by telling him the outrageous lie that his daughter can spin straw into gold. Poor daughter! Of course she can't do that! The king locks her in a room full of straw and tells her that if she doesn't spin all the straw into gold in one night, he's going to kill her! A strange little man appears and spins the straw into gold for her. This happens twice more, and, on the third night, the king says he will marry the miller's daughter if she can once again spin the straw into gold. The strange little man appears again and spins the straw into gold on the condition that she will give him her firstborn child. A year or so after the marriage, the Queen has a baby and who should turn up but the strange little man. He tells the Queen that if she can tell him his name, he will allow her to keep her baby. Smart Queen sends one of her maids out to the woods to eavesdrop on the little man and finds him singing a song to himself that, conveniently, contains his name. She correctly names the little man, thus keeping her baby and they all live happily ever after.

The Analysis
Paul Zelinsky is a wonderful artist, as is evident by his Caldecott award and three Caldecott honor books. I like the facial expressions the miller's daughter/queen has throughout the book and how accurately they correspond with the story. The oil-painted artwork was definitely worthy of a Caldecott Honor and was done in Renaissance style by painting over watercolor with oil paints. It's very beautiful.

About the story, it's interesting to read the note on the text at the end of the book, where Zelinsky discusses how the story of Rumpelstiltsken came about and that he used several editions and some of his own words to create his version. The thing I don't understand about the story is this: Why in the world would you marry a man that threatened to kill you on more than one occasion?!

The Review
Tammy (BookHive (www.bookhive.org))
Could you spin straw into gold? Well, that is exactly what a greedy King orders a miller's daughter to do in this tale. Locked in a room she becomes so desperate to do what the King asks that she is forced to bargain with a tiny man whom she eventually promises her first born child. When the time comes to give up her child she can only break the bargain by guessing the strange little man's name. Based on the Grimm brothers' earliest version Zelinsky's beautifully detailed oil paintings depict the medieval time period wonderfully and add a creative element to this well-known tale.

The Connection
If I didn't use this story as part of my Fairy/Folk Tales storytime, I would also be inclined to do a storytime only using books illustrated by Paul O. Zelinsky, such as Hansel and Gretel and Dust Devil, written by Anne Isaacs. Or maybe have a Paul O. Zelinsky storytime featuring Rumpelstiltskin and his other Caldecott award and honor winners, Rapunzel, Swamp Angel and Hansel and Gretel. We could then attempt to mimic his art style by painting a picture, then painting over it in another media.

Turtle's Race with Beaver

The Bibliography
Bruchac, Joseph, and James Bruchac. 2003. Turtle's Race with Beaver. Ill. by Jose Aruego and Ariane Dewey. New York: Dial Books for Young Readers. ISBN 00803728522

The Plot
During spring, summer and fall, Turtle loves sunning on the rocks in her very own pond. When winter rolls around, Turtle swims to the bottom of her pond to hibernate. While Turtle is resting in the muck, Beaver moves in and takes over the pond, building himself a dam and a lodge. Uh oh! When spring comes back around, Turtle swims to the surface to find that her pond has completely changed! She offers to share her pond with Beaver, but he won't have any of that. He challenges Turtle to a swimming race for ownership of the pond, but Turtle outsmarts him and wins the race. Turtle again offers to share the pond with Beaver, but he's too embarrassed by his loss (and probably his stubbornness), so he moves away to another pond that is also inhabited by a turtle. This time, he knows better, and learns to share.

The Analysis
The illustrations in this book are fantastic. Each page is full of brilliant colors using pen-and-ink, gouache (like watercolor but a little heavier, thicker and darker) and pastels. Lots of people, in fact, some of the reviewers that I read, believe this story to be the Bruchacs' retelling of The Tortoise and the Hare, but it's not! This story does not come from Aesop or Africa, but from (most likely, according to Joseph Bruchac) the Iroquois in the Northeastern United States.

The only negative thing I can say about this book is that on some of the pages where there is a large paragraph of text, it's difficult to read the black text on the colorful background, so if I were reading this story aloud during storytime, I might have a hard time of it.

The Review
Janice M. Del Negro (The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books, January 2004 (Vol. 57, No. 5)) Father and son team Joseph and James Bruchac follow their previous picture book collaboration, How Chipmunk Got His Stripes (BCCB 3/01), with this Seneca tale of a good-natured turtle who outwits a selfish beaver. A happy resident of "a beautiful little pond," Turtle buries herself in the mud for the winter without a thought of trouble, but while she is sleeping, Beaver arrives and claims her pond as his own. Come spring, Turtle emerges and discovers the interloper; her suggestion to Beaver that they share the pond is met with a challenge to race. Word of the race spreads through the forest, and all the animals come to root for their favorite, but Turtle wins the race with a clever trick. Despite her offer that they share the pond, Beaver slinks away in embarrassment--but it’s clear from the conclusion that even old Beavers can learn new tricks. The language is crisply effective, and the contrast between Turtle’s bucolic life and Beaver’s industrious one and their inevitable conflict have innate suspense. The text builds to a careening momentum that culminates in Turtle’s win, making this prime readaloud or storytelling material. Aruego and Dewey’s pen-and-ink, gouache, and pastel illustrations reflect the story’s energy in the linear compositions and the zingy palette. Joseph Bruchac includes an opening note about the origins and sources of this story; James also includes some information about uses for this humorous teaching tale.

The Connection
This would be an excellent story to incorporate into a Folktales storytime that I do using any one of the various retellings of Jack and the Beanstalk, The Three Billy Goats Gruff and any of those Enormous Potato/Carrot/Turnip stories. I also have made giant mad-lib style stories to accompany some of my storytimes, and for this one, I'd probably use my version of The Emperor's New Clothes where the kids choose funny words to replace integral words in the story. They always love that, especially because I made a special, extra large briefcase type thing to carry them in, so they travel! Ahh, the joys of being a programmer!

The Tale of Peter Rabbit

The Bibliography
Potter, Beatrix. 2001. The Tale of Peter Rabbit. Ill. by Michael Hague. New York: SeaStar Books. ISBN 1587170523

The Plot
Mrs. Rabbit goes to market one morning and leaves explicit instructions for her little rabbit children, Flopsy, Mopsy, Cotton-tail and Peter, to stay away from Mr. McGregor's garden, lest they be made into rabbit pie like their dear old father. Of course, Peter goes straight there and gets into trouble. Mr. McGregor catches him wandering through the garden and chases him through the cabbages, the potatoes, the gooseberries and finally into the toolshed. Unfortunatley, during this little escapade, Peter loses his shoes and his fancy jacket. Looking for the gate so he can go home, he comes across a mouse and a cat, but neither help him find his way out. He finally spots the gate, but it's right behind Mr. McGregor! Peter sneaks around and escapes under the gate just as Mr. McGregor spots him again. Since he's so tired from his brush with rabbit pie, Peter collapses as soon as he gets back home. Mrs. Rabbit puts him in bed with a spoonful of camomile tea while his sisters enjoy a delicious meal of bread, milk and blackberries. Poor, poor Peter should have listened to his mother.

The Analysis
The artwork for this book was made with pen and ink, watercolor and colored pencils and it creeps me out. The colors are rich and beautiful and some of the illustrations don't freak me out, but some of them definitely do. The page where Peter rushes all over the garden and loses his shoes is perhaps the creepiest of all. It should almost be called Peter Rabid instead of Peter Rabbit.... Anyway, other than the sometimes eerie illustrations, this tale of a badly behaved bunny teaches us all a lesson - to listen to our elders and always follow directions! Children may not understand all the words, such as the sparrows "who flew to [Peter] in great excitement, and implored him to exert himself," but they'd get the idea that the sparrows came to help Peter when he was in trouble by looking the illustrations, and that's what good illustrators do... even though I didn't like the illustrations, I can appreciate the richness of them.

The Review
Kathy Broderick (Booklist, Jul. 1, 2001 (Vol. 97, No. 21))
As he has done before, Hague lends his own style to a classic title in the canon of children's literature. Enlarging the original size of Potter's book and decreasing the length to standard picture-book size, he brings the famous story to a new audience. The flow of text and turn of the page has been changed substantially, but Peter is larger in these pictures, and the colors of his world much brighter. Hague adds details that don't appear in Potter's illustrations--a bright red door on the tree house, the inside of the baker's shop, the "large pea" in the old mouse's mouth. There's also more of Mr. McGregor's garden, his house, and the wood beyond. There are fewer illustrations in Hague's version, but his double-page spreads flesh out Potter's world (as the video adaptations of her stories do, as well). This format is certainly better suited to storytimes, and the text, with one exception, is faithful to the original: the white cat is now black, and the word white has been deleted.

The Connection
So, since I chose to review three rabbit books for the picture book genre, I apparently, deep down on the inside, want to do a Rabbit Storytime. I'd add in a few more books, like Bunnies on the Go by Rick Walton or any of the Nicky books by Valeri Gorbachev (Nicky and the Big Bad Wolves, Nicky and the Fantastic Birthday Gift, or Nicky and the Rainy Day). If I don't do a Rabbit Storytime, I at least need to make myself some bunny ears to wear around the library to quell the urge.

My Friend Rabbit

The Bibliography
Rohmann, Eric. 2002. My Friend Rabbit. Brookfield: Roaring Brook Press. ISBN 0761315357

The Plot
Mouse's friend Rabbit is a pretty good friend, but whenever he's around, something crazy always happens. In My Friend Rabbit, Mouse gets a toy airplane and lets Rabbit play with it, too. Uh oh! The airplane gets stuck in a tree! Mouse knew something bad would happen, but, not to worry, because Rabbit has a plan. Rabbit gathers several more friends - an elephant, a rhinocerous, a hippopotamus, a deer, an alligator, a bear, a duck, some ducklings and a squirrel - and stacks them in a precarious pile. Of course, we all know what happens next. Mouse is on top of the pile just inches away from his plane when the pivoting pillar of pals topples to the ground. Luckily, Mouse boards the plane and flies down to rescue Rabbit from his angry cohorts, but wouldn't you know, they crash right back into that tree! Don't worry though, Rabbit has another plan ...

The Analysis
The illustrations in this Caldecott-winning book - heavily outlined, hand-colored woodcuts - tell a wonderful story that doesn't require words, but there are just a few anyway. The story is one of good friends playing well together and the illustrations really convey that with detailed, but cartoony at the same time, facial expressions. As a programmer, I more than likely wouldn't use this book just because there are so few words. Sitting one on one with a child and reading this book would be just fine because they could take in all the illustrations and see what happens on each page, but sharing it with a group of kids wouldn't quite work out so well. I think the majority of the excitement in my storytelling comes from my voices and inflection, so telling a story with only 75 or so words is not very exciting.

The Review
Susie Wilde (Children's Literature)
You can pretty much guess the story from the first page in My Friend Rabbit. The narrator, a small brown mouse, tells us that his friend Rabbit, "means well. But whatever he does, wherever he goes, trouble follows." After Rabbit launches mouse's airplane into a tree, he drags a cast of creatures ten times his size into a ridiculous pile. Then he mounts the animal mountain to retrieve mouse's plane. Unlike many Caldecotts, this year's award honors a book for young children. And Rohmann got it right in terms of this audience. Rabbit has the silly slapstick humor that young listeners find sublime. A three-year-old will giggle when rabbit hauls the huge elephant, or hoists the fat purple hippo. In this book of few words, the "trouble follows" line is repeated three times, giving young children a place to participate. In terms of illustration, the colored wood-block prints are simple, the backgrounds clear, and page layouts dramatize the story with interesting perspectives and compositions. You have to turn the book to view the climax, a vertical rendering of the pile of precariously balanced animals. The animals' faces lend a strong feeling tone. Thankfully, messages are buried in this book which accents humor instead of moral. But the pictures and words provide comfort for children viewed as troublesome, and offer a strong argument for sticking with colorful, unique playmates.

The Connection
Like I said before, I probably wouldn't use this book during storytime, just because it has so few words; however, if I were so inclined, I could perhaps use this book along with Lettice: The Flying Rabbit by Mandy Stanley and, what else? Knuffle Bunny Free by Mo Willems and have a bunny-riding-in-an-airplane storytime. We could make little paper airplanes and little bunny puppets and launch them across the library. Sounds like fun, right?

Knuffle Bunny Free

The Bibliography
Willems, Mo. 2010. Knuffle Bunny Free. New York: HarperCollins Publishers. ISBN 0061929571

The Plot
Trixie, Knuffle Bunny and Trixie's mom and dad take a trip to visit her grandparents who live all the way in Holland, and Trixie knows that Holland is far away. After a long plane trip, Trixie and her parents finally arrive at Oma and Opa's house! Not long after their arrival, Trixie realizes someone is missing and that someone is KNUFFLE BUNNY! It turns out that Knuffle Bunny stayed on the plane and took a trip of his own to China. While Knuffle Bunny is gone, Trixie has to be brave and have fun without Knuffle Bunny. One night, she dreams of Knuffle Bunny and his amazing adventures and all the places he would go and all the kids he would meet. When she wakes up, she is very happy and she realizes she is getting to be a pretty big girl. Finally it is time for Trixie and her mom and dad to go back home. Who happens to be on the plane when they board? None other than Knuffle Bunny. In a moment of true big girlness, Trixie gives Knuffle Bunny to a crying baby because she knows that Knuffle Bunny can make the baby happy. Trixie is definitely a big girl now!

The Analysis
The Knuffle Bunny series is not my favorite by Mo Willems (Pigeon is, of course!), but this one nearly brought a tear to my eye. Mo Willems always has a certain flair in his illustrations, the facial expressions are fantastic and the layering of inked drawings over actual photographs makes you feel like the story is real, in this case, like you really traveled on an airplane to Holland. The foldout near the end of the book is an excellent addition and makes the reader realize just how far Knuffle Bunny went in that dream, across a HUGE, four-page spread! If children read the first Knuffle Bunny when it came out in 2004, read the second when it was released in 2007, and finished with this one in 2010, they would have grown up with Trixie and maybe would have gone through the same things she did. It's always pleasant when you grow up with books, and growing up with Trixie would have been a heartwarming and learning experience for kids.

The Review
Daniel Kraus (Booklist, Jul. 1, 2010 (Vol. 106, No. 21))
The saga of Knuffle Bunny concludes in this droll, observant, and seriously heartbreaking ode to growing up. Trixie’s a little older now, sporting a shorter haircut, a backpack, and, of course, ratty old Knuffle Bunny. Destination: Holland, the home of beloved grandparents Oma and Opa. Riding in a plane is exciting (watching Knuffle Bunny go through the X-ray machine is a little scary, though), and soon Trixie is sipping chocolate milk with her extended family. Well, you can guess what readers discover next: Knuffle Bunny has been left on the plane. What you might not guess is the poignancy and nuance of everything that follows. The plane, off to China, isn’t coming back. There’s no hysterics this time, just a wide-eyed Trixie dealing with the tension of knowing she is at a milestone of maturation yet afraid to fully commit. Her tour of Holland is alternately happy and sad (the replacement robot bunny that says, Ik Kan Spreken! doesn’t help much) until a gorgeous four-page foldout dream of Knuffle Bunny’s life in the wider world puts Trixie at ease. The denouement is enough to give you goose bumps, and young children may be wiping the tears from their parents’ cheeks. Good night, Knuffle Bunny.

The Connection
I could use this book in programs this summer during SRC, since the theme is One World, Many Stories. It would be interesting to read other stories that mention Holland, like The First Tulips in Holland by Phyllis Krasilovsky, The Hole in the Dyke by Norma Green, or Katje: The Windmill Cat by Gretchen Woelfle. Then we could do a craft with tulips or windmills, since they are also from the Netherlands. An origami windmill would be fun to make!