What makes Robert Munsch’s stories so popular? They’re contemporary and zany, reflecting “a jaunty belief in the power of children…” says Horn Book Magazine. This first best-of collection features five all-time favorites: David’s Father, The Fire Station, I Have to Go!, The Paper Bag Princess, Thomas’ Snowsuit, Michael Martchenko’s exuberant artwork has been re-sized for this new format.
Short Stories – Anthologies – Collections
Scribbling Women
In 1855, Nathaniel Hawthorne wrote to his publisher, complaining about the irritating fad of “scribbling women.” Whether they were written by professionals, by women who simply wanted to connect with others, or by those who wanted to leave a record of their lives, those “scribbles” are fascinating, informative, and instructive. Margaret Catchpole was a transported prisoner whose eleven letters provide the earliest record of white settlement in Australia. Writing hundreds of years later, Aboriginal writer Doris Pilkey wrote a novel about another kind of exile in Australia. Young Isabella Beeton, one of twenty-one children and herself the mother of four, managed to write a groundbreaking cookbook before she died at the age of twenty-eight. World traveler and journalist Nelly Bly used her writing to expose terrible injustices. Sei Shonagan left poetry and journal entries that provide a vivid look at the pampered life and intrigues in Japan’s imperial court. Ada Blackjack, sole survivor of a disastrous scientific expedition in the Arctic, fought isolation and fear with her precious Eversharp pencil. Dr. Dang Thuy Tram’s diary, written in a field hospital in the steaming North Vietnamese jungle while American bombs fell, is a heartbreaking record of fear and hope. Many of the women in “Scribbling Women” had eventful lives. They became friends with cannibals, delivered babies, stole horses, and sailed on whaling ships. Others lived quietly, close to home. But each of them illuminated the world through her words.
Three-Minute Tales
Three Minute Tales compiles delightful collection of entertaining stories from around the world to read or tell on any occasion.
Beautiful Signs/Ayat Jamilah
Drawing from not only the Qur’an and the traditions of Islamic spirituality, but also from mystical verse and folk tales, this collection of stories gathers traditional stories from the farthest reaches of the Muslim world. Includes explanatory notes. Illustrations.
The Master Swordsman and the Magic Doorway: Two Legends from Ancient China
In two original stories set in ancient China, Little Chiu masters the sword and Mu Chi escapes death through his marvelous painting.
Santa Claus in Baghdad: Stories about Teens in the Arab World
A collection of eight stories, most previously published in other anthologies, about what it is like to grow up in the Middle East today.
Give Me Shelter
The phrase “asylum seeker” is one heard in the media all the time. It stimulates fierce and controversial debate, in arguments about migration, race, and religion. The movement of people from poor or struggling countries to those where there may be opportunities for a better life is a constant in human history, but it is something with particular relevance in this time of wide-scale political and social upheaval. Featuring stories from youth based in trouble spots around the world — including Kosovo, Ethiopia, Vietnam, Eritrea, Zaire, Sudan, Somalia, Iraq, Zimbabwe, and Kurdistan — this collection of stories spotlights people who have been forced to leave their homes or families to seek help and shelter elsewhere. This book has no political axe to grind, simply recording the truth of these children’s stories without assigning blame. Some are about young people traveling to other countries; others are concerned with young ones left behind when parents are forced to flee. These are stories about physical and emotional suffering but also about humanity — of both those who endure unimaginable hardship and those who help them.
Maui and the Secret of Fire
What My Father Gave Me
Passionate, compelling essays reveal how daughters see their fathers. Editor Melanie Little brings together seven outstanding women — including Susan Olding, Jessica Raya and Saleema Nawaz — to write brilliant, powerful accounts of father-daughter relationships during their teen years. These deeply personal narratives draw readers into raw, real-life experiences. One girl recalls the parade of men in her mother’s life until a man named Al unexpectedly becomes the father she never had. Another father’s abandonment leads his teen daughter to enter a string of doomed relationships with older men, fueled by her “pilot light of pure hatred.” Another reveals the harrowing secret she guarded as a teen: the sexual abuse she suffered at the hands of her father. One girl watches as the father she loves and respects struggles on the picket lines during a lockout at work and through an ensuing depression. Another daughter charts her own reckless behavior against that of her father’s, in search of a way to break the cycle. Gutsy and honest, these true stories invite readers behind secret doors as they celebrate the power of words to connect to the teen experience.
Bloody Horowitz
A famous children’s author stalked and killed? A prominent publisher murdered by an egomaniacal author for being asked to make cuts? A reality TV show pitting teens against grown-ups’ with only one survivor? Readers will smile in terrified pleasure as they read these harrowing tales.
