The Value of Fairy Tales

Fairy Tale and Folk Tale recommendations at A Mighty Girl from picture books to chapter books including books with diverse characters. One of my favorites is Uni the Unicorn by Amy Krouse Rosenthal.

The Paper Bag Princess by Robert Munch is one of my go to books for baby showers. 

The Sonoma County Library has eighteen copies. The AR is 3.8.

The Princess in Black series by Shannon and Dean Hale is a favorite of my youngest granddaughter.

The Sonoma County Library has eighteen copies. Thr AR is 3.2.

The Whisper by Pamela Zagerenski 

Goldilocks and the Three Dinosaurs by Mo Willems

Ophelia and the Marvelous Boy by Karen Foxlee

The Sonoma County Library has thirteen copies. The AR is 4.9.

This just a sample of the almost 200 books with mighty girls as heroines at A Mighty Girl. There are literally hundreds of articles and topics all with book recommendations, check it out.

The Whisper

Two time winner of Caldecott Honors, Pamela Zagarenski, has written a celebration of story telling and imagination, The Whisper. A little girl who loves words and stories is lent a magical book by her teacher. On her way home, words spill out of the book. We can see, but she cannot, a fox gathering all the words into a net. When she gets home and opens the book she can see all the beautiful pictures but there are no words. How can there be stories without words? She hears a wind blow and a small voice whisper: "You can imagine the words, you can imagine the stories."

It felt difficult at first to imagine a story, but she looked harder at the details: are the two bears best friends? Is one of them bringing a gift of honey to the other bear? She had a title, Blue Bear's Visit, and then a story. So the reader can get into the fun, we see the pages in the magical book. The little girl can be seen in the bottom of each two page spread. as she turns the pages, she gets quicker at finding the stories in the pictures. Before she returns the book to school, she meets the fox and he gives her the words he gathered and she helps him reach a bunch of grapes. 

Those familiar with Zagarenski's illustrations in Sleep Like A Tiger will recognize her signature wheels, tea cups crowns and tigers. This book is a feast for the eyes. It also offers a child an opportunity to make up her own stories.

The Sonoma County Library has eight copies.

Beautiful Children’s Books

Apartment Therapy  (who knew?) writes about the  20 Most Beautiful Children’s Books. There is a  blog favorite on the list, Sleep Like A Tiger. Lots of classics like Where the Wild Things Are, Madeline and Good Night Moon plus newer classics like Olivia and The Very Hungry Caterpillar. Since this is a decorating article, there were also links for ways to display your children’s books to entice them to pick up a book and read. 7 Ideas for Making a Forward Facing Book Display and Little Readers: Most Appealing Book Displays of the Year give you plenty of ideas for interesting and pleasing ways to display books.

Hat tip: Jump Into A Book

Sleep Like A Tiger

 Sleep Like A Tiger by Mary Logue and illustrated by Pamela Zagarenski was awarded a 2013 Caldecott Honor on Jan 28, 2013 by the Association for Library Service to Children, a division of the American Library Association. This is not your usual bedtime story. “Once there was a little girl who didn’t want to go to sleep even though the sun had gone away” begins the book. In the illustration, the sun goes away on the back of a crown wearing tiger. The words and the pictures tell a rich story filled with symbolism.

The little girl tells her parents she is not tired. Her parents said she did not have to go to sleep but she did have to put on her pajamas. She was still wide awake. They asked her to brush her teeth and wash her face. Though still not sleepy, she loved her bed, so she climbed in. She asked her parents, “Does everything in the world go to sleep?”. Yes, they replied. Their dog was sleeping now on the couch where he didn’t belong and the cat was fast asleep by the fire. Do bats sleep? Not at night, but during the day, folding their wings and sleeping upside down in the barn. What about whales? And tiny snail? And even grizzly bears? The little girl knows another animal that sleeps a lot, the tiger, who sleeps so he can stay strong. Her parents kiss her goodnight and she tells them that she is still not sleepy. They tell her she can stay awake all night. The girl slowly falls asleep as she copies the sleeping habits of the animals she and her parents discussed.

There has been some questions from kids  about the crowns on the characters in this book. There are wheels all over every page, some of the moons have William Blake’s poem Tyger, Tyger faintly printed on them. There teacups and tea pots  on many pages. This is a devise the illustrator, Pamela Zagarenski, used in her previous Caldecott Honor book, Sings Red from Treetops: A Year in Colors written by Joyce Sidman. She tells us on her website that she wants us to make up stories and reasons for ourselves about her imagery to discover a secret key within us that unlocks a mysterious door. Whether or not you are looking to unlock any mysterious doors, this book has lyrical prose and beautiful illustrations. That is enough for me.

The Sonoma County Library has several copies.