The Animal Family [Library Binding]

Randall Jarrell (Author), Maurice Sendak (Illustrator)

Book Description

A beautifully written fantasy, featuring illustrations by the renowned Maurice Sendak and capturing the magical atmosphere of the great fairy tales, tells how a lonely hunter goes about finding a family for himself. Reissue. Newbery Honor Book. NYT. H. SLJ.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

"Once upon a time, long, long ago, where the forest runs down to the ocean, a hunter lived all alone in a house made of logs he had chopped for himself and shingles he had split for himself." These words ease the reader into the elegant, dreamlike world of Randall Jarrell's Newbery Honor book The Animal Family. One night, the lonely hunter hears the singing of a mermaid, and because "he himself was as patient as an animal," the mermaid learns to trust him, speaking to him in a voice like the water. In time they teach each other their languages, with many amusing exchanges occurring as the hunter tries to teach his new friend terrestrial words and concepts. The hunter explains, "The house is a big wooden thing ... that you stay inside at night or when it rains." "Why?" she asks. "To keep from getting wet." "To keep from getting wet?" the mermaid says despairingly.

The mermaid and the hunter become a family when the hunter takes a bear cub from its mother to live with them as a son. "The bear's table manners were bad. But so were the mermaid's--especially as she couldn't resist throwing the bear pieces of fish." Having a bear around seems perfectly normal, but not quite a complete family, so eventually the hunter captures a spotted baby lynx. When the lynx brings home not another dead partridge, but a little boy, the delicate, playful family dynamics change again. This book of low-key epiphanies is packed with delightful, illuminating, often unexpected comparisons of the ocean world and the land world most non-mermaids wouldn't have considered. Enhanced by a beautiful design and gorgeous illustrations by Maurice Sendak, this book is perfect for any reader--young or old--ready for a bit of gentle philosophy with a decided twinkle. (All ages) --Karin Snelson --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Publishers Weekly

A reprint of the classic 1965 Newbery Honor Book. Ages 6-up.
Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Library Binding
• Publisher: Harpercollins (January 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0062050893
• ISBN-13: 978-0062050892
• Product Dimensions: 7 x 5.8 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (23 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #10,231,834 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars My favorite book from childhood, December 5, 2001

By 

Alexandra Fiona Dixon (San Francisco, CA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Animal Family (Hardcover)

The day after I turned eight years old, my family moved into a house next door to the Golden Gate Valley Branch public library in San Francisco. I lived there for the next nine years exactly, moving out on my 17th birthday, and spent six days a week in the library next door (except for that brief period when I was banned for having 77 overdue books, and had to work off my fines before they'd let me back in). I'd have been in there seven days a week except they were closed on Sunday, which has ever since been my least favorite day of the week.

There were several children's librarians there during the years I lived next door, and they all took an interest in me as I was such a voracious reader. One gave me a copy of The Animal Family as a birthday present one year, and it immediately became my favorite book.

This story is so simply told, yet so beautiful that it has stayed with me all my life (30 years and counting since I first read it). Before the internet came along, I made it a point to locate used copies through the booksellers' network, and kept several copies on hand so that I could give them away whenever I met a special child who I thought would appreciate it.

You can read the other reviews if you want to know the story line... nothing can do it justice, however, except just reading the book. When you start, you won't want the story to end, and when it does, you will be sad that things the world - families and relationships - aren't really as beautiful, simple and loving as they are in the book.

This is an absolute MUST READ for any child. Or adult.

15 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Stuff Dreams Are Made of, July 31, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: The Animal Family (Hardcover)

Even as a third grader I was an avid reader in search of great books. By passing the standard issue Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys, I wanted the stuff dreams were made of. I remember discovering The Animal Family and being more intreagued by its presentation (a smallish book with wide margins on each page, crammed amid the large, brightly colored books of the children's library). But the opening page drew me in and kept me entranced for days. I re-read the book whenever I could find it in the school library-until it disappeared. Last night, my five-year-old daughter asked me to tell her a story. I searched the depths of my memory and began the story of a "lonely hunter who lived in a log cabin where the woods meet the beach. One night he heard a mermaid singing..." As my daugter's eyes grew wide while she watched my face, hoping, perhaps, to pull the words all the faster from my memory, I knew I needed to find the book that 30 years ago enthralled me with its uniqueness and then stayed in my memory long enough to promise the same for my daughter.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars My favorite book from childhood, December 5, 2001

By 

Alexandra Fiona Dixon (San Francisco, CA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Animal Family (Hardcover)

A librarian gave me a copy of The Animal Family as a birthday present one year, and it immediately became my favorite book.

This story is so simply told, yet so beautiful that it has stayed with me all my life (30 years and counting since I first read it). I keep several copies of it so that I can give them away whenever I meet a special child who I think would appreciate it.

You can read the other reviews if you want to know the story line... nothing can do it justice, however, except just reading it. When you start, you won't want the story to end, and when it does, you will be sad that the world - and relationships - aren't really as beautiful as they are in the book.

This is an absolute MUST READ for any child. Or adult.