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W 2000 Blue Peter Book Awards: The Best Book to Read Aloud

About the Author

Julia Donaldson is one of today's most popular children's writers. Her many best-selling picture book collaborations with Axel Scheffler include THE GRUFFALO'S CHILD (978-1-4050-2046-6), THE SNAIL AND THE WHALE (978-0-333-98224-2) and CHARLIE COOK'S FAVOURITE BOOK (978-1-4050-3470-8). Julia also writes plays and songs, and is always in demand for her brilliant children's shows. Axel Scheffler is a star illustrator in the children's book world, and has created many wonderful books for Macmillan. He has enjoyed particular acclaim for his work with Julia Donaldson, but is also the creator of fantastic novelty books such as THE TICKLE BOOK (978-1-4050-5363-1), as well as MOTHER GOOSE'S NURSERY RHYMES (978-0-333-96136-0), a treasury of nursery rhymes and original stories.

Reviews

A clever, exuberant story in rhyme with strong, color-saturated pictures to match . . . This is a sure bet. (Booklist)

A rollicking good time. (School Library Journal)

A clever, exuberant story in rhyme with strong, color-saturated pictures to match . . . This is a sure bet. (Booklist)
A rollicking good time. (School Library Journal)

The eponymous character introduced by this British team owes a large debt to Maurice Sendak's Where the Wild Things Are. When Mouse meets Fox in the "deep dark wood," he invents a story about the gruffalo, described very much like Sendak's fearsome quartet of wild thingsÄ"He has terrible tusks, and terrible claws, and terrible teeth in his terrible jaws." The gullible fox runs away when Mouse tells him that the gruffalo's favorite food is roasted fox. "Silly old Fox!" says Mouse, "Doesn't he know?/ There's no such thing as a gruffalo!" Owl and Snake follow suit until, with a turn of the page, Mouse runs into the creature he has imagined. Quick-thinking Mouse then tells the monster, "I'm the scariest creature in this deep dark wood./ Just walk behind me and soon you'll see,/ Everyone for miles is afraid of me." Fox, Owl and Snake appear to be terrified of the tiny mouse, but readers can plainly see the real object of their fears. By story's end, the gruffalo flees, and Mouse enjoys his nut lunch in peace. Despite the derivative plot line, debut author Donaldson manipulates the repetitive language and rhymes to good advantage, supplying her story with plenty of scary-but-not-too-scary moments. Scheffler's gruffalo may seem a goofy hybrid of Max's wild things, but his cartoonlike illustrations build suspense via spot-art previews of the monster's orange eyes, black tongue and purple prickles until the monster's appearance in full. Ages 4-8. (June) Copyright 1999 Cahners Business Information.