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Subjects -> Children's Books -> Ages 4-8 -> General
Subjects -> Children's Books -> Ages 4-8 -> General AAS
Subjects -> Children's Books -> Authors & Illustrators, A-Z -> ( H ) -> Hague, Michael
Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 4
Average rating: 5.0 of 5
Art book or story book? You decide. 5 out of 5 stars.
33 of 33 people found this review helpful.
One could as easily buy this book for the illustrations as for the stories. Either one justifies the purchase price while the other makes this book a prize. While I was trying to read the book, my 12-year-old daughter kept taking it from my desk to read a story at bedtime, and my best friend, who is an artist, wanted to borrow it to study the drawings and paintings. "The Book of Fairies" begins with an excerpt from "Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens" by J. M. Barrie. "Lock-out Time" is a charming story which introduces readers to the fairy world. As Mr. Barrie says, "One of the great differences between the fairies and us is that they never do anything useful." He goes on to explain the origin of fairies, "When the first baby laughed for the first time, his laugh broke into a million pieces and they all went skipping about. That was the beginning of fairies." I had heard that saying before but never knew from where it came. This story is about the fairy ball that goes on in Kensington Gardens once the gates are locked. The story came alive for me because of its references to things one might find today in Kensington Gardens. One such reference is to "the boards which tell at what time the gardens are to close today." The story tells of how the fairies change the times written on the boards to confuse people. Some 15 or so years ago my husband was visiting London and took an afternoon off to read and sun himself in Kensington Gardens. He fell asleep (perhaps he was sprinkled with fairy dust) and missed lock-out time. When he awoke the gates were locked, and he, along with a few other enchanted ones, had to scramble over the fences. If only he had stayed for the ball.
The book includes stories the reader may know, such as the oft retold "Thumbelina" by Hans Christian Andersen and the eerily sensual "Goblin Market" by Chistina Rosetti. There are also less familiar ones such as "The Fairies" by William Allingham, which must have influenced the contemporary "Mogwogs on the March" by Olivier Dunrea, and "The Brownie o' Ferne-Den" retold by Virginia Haviland, whose premise may be recognizable by Girl Scouts. My daughter's favorite was "Fairer-than-a- Fairy" by Charlotte-Rose Caumont de la Force.
And then, there are the pictures. There are paintings with rich vibrant colors and details which are a feast for the eye and an inspiration for the imagination, and there are pen and ink drawings with both the detail and precision of fine etchings and the whimsy of fairy tales. Click on the link at "Look inside this book!" on the book's ... page to see a couple of the paintings, although bites and pixels don't do justice to the artist's paper work.
Michael Hague also selected and illustrated "The Book of Dragons". That book does for dragons what this book does for fairies. I strongly recommend it as well and for much the same reasons as I do "The Book of Fairies".
Linda Murphy
Children's Editor of the Writers Hood
...
Editorial Review:
In stories, songs, and poems, fairies have lived tantalizingly close to human folk for centuries. Unpredictable and elusive, they've brought luck and done harm, while people have longed for a glimpse of their magical world. In his illustrations for this rich and varied collection, Michael Hague, one of America's most beloved painters of fantasy, creates a fabled world that belongs to the fairies. There is the lost flower fairy Thumbelina, the cruel and clever goblins of Christina Rossetti's Goblin Market, and the invisible creatures of James Barrie's Lock-out Time. Readers will also meet a helpful brownie, a girl with an unlucky name, and two elves who act like playground bullies!
Readers will find themselves transported to fairyland as they read these delightful works and savor the mesmerizing full-color and black-and-white illustrations. Michael Hague's art has never been so enchanting.
