Corey Rosen Schwartz

Author Corey Rosen Schwartz and illustrator Dan Santat, whose previous collaborate effort, The Three Ninja Pigs, offered a martial arts rewrite of a classic fairy-tale, here turn their attention to the story of Little Red Riding Hood. Disturbed by his lack of success with the three little pigs, our wolf villain decides to train himself, eventually mastering the art of karate. Little does he realize however, that his new targets - Red and her grandmother - are also masters...

Like its show more predecessor, Ninja Red Riding Hood offers an entertaining variation on a well-known tale, pairing a rhyming text with colorful artwork. The wolf, who "kept getting licked / by the dinner he picked," makes for an amusing villain, and his second attempt to secure dinner makes for an engaging read-aloud, particularly for little would-be ninjas and fans of fractured fairy-tales. I don't know that I love this book as much as the co-workers who recommended it to me - I tend to prefer the original fairy-tales, in all their unexpurgated glory - but for fans of this sort of thing this will be a welcome addition to their picture-book library. show less

Less math than I expected, but a cute addition to the canon of Cinderella tales. Oppressed by their mean stepmother, Cinderella and Tinderella each do "half the mopping, / half the raking, / half the shopping, / chopping, baking. / Half the folding, / half the mending, / half the mean / stepsister tending." When, after the ball, the prince comes searching for the twins, Tin observes that you can't divide a prince in half, but asks their fairy godmother, "Can you make a double?" With the show more prince "prepared the share" ("I'd gladly give up all my stuff, / it's love that I believe in"), he gets a twin too. While the original prince and Cinderella wind up taking the spotlight, the other pair "won all the kingdom's highest math awards." This clever rhyming tale inserts a STEM angle to the original.

See also: Interstellar Cinderella show less

When their father is kidnapped by a fox, two ninja chicks swing into action in this rhyming picture-book, tracking him down to the fox's corn-bread cottage in the forest. There they must engage in some hand-to-hand combat to rescue their parents, eventually triumphing and going on become crusaders to protect other endangered fowl...

The third fractured fairy-tale retelling from Corey Rosen Schwartz and Dan Santat, following upon The Three Ninja Pigs and Ninja Red Riding Hood, this adapted show more Hansel and Gretel also features the collaboration of co-author Rebecca J. Gomez. Like its predecessors, it presents a martial-arts remake of a traditional tale, paired with colorful artwork by Santat. Unlike its predecessors, it features a fox villain, rather than a wolf (readers will recall that the wolf was reformed at the end of Ninja Red Riding Hood, and took up yoga), and it also drifts further from the original tale on which it is based. Unlike the original, Hensel and Gretrel: Ninja Chicks features a vulpine villain, rather than a witchy one; and parents in need of rescue, rather than derelict in their duty. I can't say, all told, that I found this one as strong as the others - the rhymes were a little more forced, and I found the depiction of the fox rather odd, as his villainy usually draws upon cunning, rather than brute force. Of course, I do research foxes, so perhaps others will have a different perspective. Recommended to anyone looking for fractured fairy-tales and/or rhyming picture-books show less

The classic story of the three little pigs is given a martial arts makeover in this amusing fractured fairy-tale, told in rhyming verse. Tired of the huffing and puffing of the local bully-wolf, three porcine siblings decide to prepare themselves by studying self defense. The first takes lessons in aikido, the second in jujitsu, and the third in karate, but only the third perseveres in her studies, eventually triumphing when the wolf comes around...

I enjoyed The Three Ninja Pigs, although show more perhaps not as much as the multiple co-workers who recommended it to me. Rhyming text always makes for a good read-aloud, and this is no exception, although there were moments when I thought the text stumbled a bit. The artwork, done by Caldecott Medalist Dan Santat, is colorful and engaging, adding to the sense of madcap fun found in the story. Recommended to anyone who enjoys fractured fairy-tales or stories featuring ninjas. show less