Rating: ***** 5 stars

Various illustrators,
Tales from Around the World: A Classic Collection
Zero to Ten, 2008.

Ages 5 - 8

Roasting hot greetings to a ‘tales from around the world’ that lives up to its title! The book opens with Aladdin and closes with the Firebird, but the former provides a fuller retelling of this shaggy mongrel story than we normally find, and the latter a more complex version than the one enacted in Stravinsky’s ballet. Amongst the seven tales between, we are treated to a shape-shifter’s chase adventure from West Africa, a romance between the people of the sky and the earth from the Cheyenne, and a heartbreaking tale of a childless Inuit woman adopting a polar bear foetus. The anonymous author has done a sterling job of sharing these stories in vivid but plain language, and the nine illustrators, one for each story, have lit up the many wonderful worlds inside this book beautifully.

Highly recommended for readers of all ages, and very, very good value for money.

George Hunt
July 2009, No. 177

Guide to the rating system:
***** 5 stars, unmissable
**** 4 stars, very good
*** 3 stars, good
** 2 stars, fair
* 1 star, poor