Mini Monday #35

Mini Monday: Where my son and I do two “mini” reviews on two children’s books. Each book will get a Thumbs up, Middle Thumb, or Thumbs down rating!

Little Red: A Fizzingly Good Yarn by Lynn RobertsIllustrated by David Roberts
Hardcover, 32 pages
Published October 1st 2005 by Harry N. Abrams
Goodreads | Amazon | The Book Depository

In the spirit of "Cinderella: An Art Deco Love Story," Lynn and David Roberts give the classic tale of Little Red Riding Hood a new, fun historical twist. 
Little Red is happily taking a basket of ginger ale to his grandmother when he stops to gather apples in the woods. Who should grab his red cape, but none other than the wily wolf, who runs immediately to the grandmother's house to devour her and wait for Little Red to be next! With a new, happily-ever-after spin on the story, the boy tricks the wolf into gulping down the entire ginger ale at once, which triggers the wolf to hiccup his grandmother out of his belly. Little Red gallantly overcomes the wolf and is the hero of the day! 
A charming variation of the classic fairytale, "Little Red Riding Hood," Little Red is set in Colonial America and is filled with imaginative illustrations and historical references.

Well this is obviously a retelling of Little Red Riding Hood. However, in this story Little Red is a boy with a red coat. Now unfortunately this book falls prey to the bad summary. If you read the summary of this story then there is really no use in picking up the book except to look at the pictures. It literally tells the entire story. This is a major reason I hardly ever read them.

There was one page that I was a little concerned about though. Little Red goes into the pantry to get some ginger ale for his grandmother and you can see all the food they have in there. However, there are dead rabbits (complete with red x’s on their chests and X’s for eyes) hanging from the ceiling. There are also chopped off pig’s heads and pigs feet in a jar. I know this is standard for that time period but I think it was a little much for a children’s book.

Besides that my son and I enjoyed this book. It was a good twist on the standard Red Riding Hood story. We both liked the artwork and if you looked closely you could see faces drawn into the forest trees. I suggest picking this up if you would like a new classic to read.

My Rating:

The Prince’s New Pet by Brian Anderson

Hardcover, 40 pages
Published December 6th 2011 by Roaring Brook Press
Goodreads | Amazon | The Book Depository

The Prince's birthday was just like every other day in his father's kingdom-drab, gloomy, and completely colorless. Years ago the Prince's father had banned all color from the kingdom, so the Prince now received the same gray gifts wrapped in the same gray paper and ate the same gray birthday cake, while outside gray skies loomed. But when a special package arrives at his party, the Prince is surprised to see a very unusual creature emerge. Will his new pet bring a splash of color to the kingdom?

After the Prince’s mother dies the King becomes so distraught that he bans all color from the kingdom because it reminded him of how much the Queen loved colors. He has a smog machine to hide the sky and everyday he has a color catcher that gets rid of any color in the kingdom. The Prince does not like the colorless world he is now forced to live in. Suddenly a box arrives at his birthday party holding a very colorful surprise!

Well right off the bat I have to say I loved the artwork in this book, especially when they introduced the colorful animal. The colors of the animal were so bright they stood out amazingly on the gray background.

There are certain parts of this book that is almost graphic novel-esque. There are no words just panels of pictures that continue to tell the story. I actually really enjoyed that. I made sure to point out each section to my son so I could tell he was following the story too.

I definitely recommend picking this book up. It was a fun read.

My Rating: