Customer Reviews

Japanese Fairy Tales Vol. 2 (Japanese Fairy Tales (Numbered))

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The book consists of six tales: The Straw Millionare; The Contest; Bouncing Rice Ball; The Monkeys' Statue; Little One Inch Boy; Tail Fishing. The humorous tales address themes such as how to live a good, kind life, how to achieve happiness, and the price to be paid for cruelty, greediness and cowardice. The tales themselves are very entertaining, but what I like most of all is that they are very well written. The words seem to flow off my tongue as I read the stories to my daughter.

I think the book is appropriately categoried in the 4-8 year range. The tales vary in length from about 400-1000 words each.

The illustrations are done in watercolor. There's one illustration per page. Each sets the stage for the tale, but leaves enough for your imagination to conjure up the rest of the story.

I like this book so much I'm going to purchase Volume 1.

Reviewed by Brianne Plach (age 9) for Reader Views (6/07)


Do you like fairy tales? If you do and are looking for something other than Cinderella or the Elves and the Shoemaker, you might like something like this. Trying something other than American fairy tales can be fun and educational at the same time.

"Japanese Fairy Tales Volume 2" is the second book in the series. It has 6 different stories within its covers. The stories include: The Straw Millionaire, The Contest, The Bouncing Rice Ball, The Monkey's Statue, Little One Inch Boy and Tail Fishing. Each one of them has a short introduction before the story begins. The stories feature things like not being greedy, how to gain happiness and how cruelty never pays. Each story is very well written. They are funny and have very good themes.

Even if this book by Keisuke Nishimoto was written for the audience of ages 4-8, and I am older than that, I still enjoyed reading the stories and somewhat getting a glimpse into Japanese culture and humor. The illustrations are in watercolor and really add delight to the stories. Take a trip to Japan by reading "Japanese Fairy Tales!"

Book received free of charge.