Brigette Barrager

I love the pictures in this---vivid, jewel-toned, with a retro style reminiscent of the Golden Books I read as a child---and the text is simple enough to be a great read aloud. But this is definitely not my favorite retelling.

From other versions of the tale, I remember a down-on-his-luck soldier, a kindly crone, an invisibility cloak, a sleeping draught, sinister princes...a world edgy with magic where wonders and horrors exist side-by-side. Brigette Barrager's reimagining may be gentler, show more but I rather doubt most children---closely attuned to the unknown, the fantastic, the wonder-full in this realm and that of their imagination---need their faery tales rendered entirely toothless. show less

Vlad was a young vampire with a love of skateboarding. Unfortunately, Miss Fussbucket, the headmistress of his school (Miss Fussbucket's School for Aspiring Spooks), did not approve. After one too many skateboarding confrontation in the hallways, she forbade Vlad from continuing while on school premises. Then a visit to the local natural history museum, and Vlad's skateboarding exploits, convinced her that the activity had great spooky potential...

Having enjoyed Brigitte Barrager's colorful show more illustrations in such magical titles as Amy Krouse Rosenthal's Uni the Unicorn and Stephanie Clarkson's Sleeping Cinderella and Other Princess Mix-Ups, I picked up Vlad the Rad - Barrager's first venture as both author and illustrator - with interest. All in all I found it engaging, and think readers who enjoy spooky but humorous picture-books will likewise find it entertaining. I don't know that I was completely won over by it, or that it will go on to become a favorite, but readers looking for new picture-books featuring skateboarders and/or monsters might want to give this one a try. show less

The art is perfectly lovely, but the original fairy tale has been stripped of everything that I enjoy so much. The lack of any sort of villainy here has dulled the story down, and makes the princesses seem insipid and lethargic (literally.) The illustrations may be full of whimsy, but the words itself are poorer for its absence.

I knew about birthstones...I had no idea about birth flowers! Each month gets a page spread with a quatrain (two rhyming couplets) about that month's birth flower and the qualities that go with it, e.g. "October's children truly care, / live to comfort, heal, and share. / A friend who knows just what to do. / Loving others is easy for you."