Customer Reviews

The Billy Goats Gruff [With Read-Along CD] (Usborne Young Reading: Series One)

5 star:		(0)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Our twin daughters were a couple months past 3 when we got them this book. I really like the artwork, and this book will also make a nice beginning reader for when the girls get to that age, we like the Usborne First Reading books and have started to collect them for the girls. It is a very high quality little hard cover book with ribbon for marking place. And these books are so inexpensive for what you are getting too. We haven't even used the CD yet. I have not seen other incarnations of this classic folk tale but would look around for others and here's why. The eldest brother tells one of the younger to "shut up" and we don't want our girls to learn to say that, but when we read it to them we change it so he says "be quiet" or "shush". And there is a bunch of story in the beginning that I don't like and think is just poor filler, the way they set up why they are going to cross the bridge, introducing the characters, and how the characters prepare for their trip. I gave this book a 3 because the girls seem to like it, one now even has a beanie goat on her bed, but it is the story they like though and it can be had in a better rendition I think.

I bought this book (not from Amazon) and my kids loved the CD sound effects. However, the eldest goat tells his younger sibling to "shut up" at one point in the book, which they of course began to parrot with delight. I'm very surprised - perhaps a cultural (US/UK) difference regarding that term, but in the US "shut up" is not a nice thing to say, particularly for young children. So, buy this book and enjoy it only if you don't mind your kids sounding like they haven't been parented properly.