Quentin Blake's Amazing Animal Stories

K-Gr 4—This collection contains a nice variety of wonder tales, pourquoi tales, and trickster tales. Readers will be surprised by how the coyote really got his yellow eyes or how the ram and his wife outsmart a young leopard and a jackal. The expressive cartoon ink-and-wash illustrations are characteristically endearing and work well with the text, which is a combination of deadpan humor and sheer ruthlessness. The hunter who breaks his promise to the tortoise ends up beheaded. And when the turkey girl is slightly late getting back from the dance, she loses everything: "…the local people still have a saying that goes: 'Life sends you what you deserve. If you are poor in feeling as well as in money, then you must expect to stay poor.'" Eleven of the 14 selections were published previously in The Singing Tortoise (Orion, 1993). The tales are set all over the world, but there are no source notes or introductions. Occasionally humans appear along with the animals, but they don't fare well in general, as the text and visuals treat them rather stereotypically. Still, the stories are engaging, told in the wry voice of traditional folktales.—Julie Roach, Cambridge Public Library, MA