Customer Reviews

Love You Forever: The Best of Robert Munsch

5 star:		(786)
4 star:		(73)
3 star:		(33)
2 star:		(35)
1 star:		(242)

 

 

This little classic is readily and easily digested by one who has known the true love of a mother. My mother gave me this book during the first Christmas with my new baby daughter in 1992. I had no idea that within the year, my father would be gone, and I would begin to give tender care to my precious little mother who would begin "getting very sick" much like the mother in the book. I cried a bucket of tears as I read it aloud with my wife, mother and father for the very first time. When my mom passed on, it was a tender and precious time at her bedside, and very reminiscent of this tender little book.

Today, my two girls go for it regularly on my shelf at bedtime. They tease me because I can't get through it without crying. Funny to me that they have a very good grasp of allegory and they, unlike some of the book's critics, understand that the scenes with the mother coming to the man's apartment are actually his memories of her love. They understand, as I explain to them that the love poured into the son by his mother, has taught him how to love his new baby daughter at the end.

Love begets love, and this little childrens' parable is a powerful reminder! I highly recommend _Love You Forever_ to anyone who enjoyed a wonderful love with their mother. To others, I'm sorry but you simply won't (and obviously don't) understand. It's not written for you.

This is a fantastic picture book that is a metaphor for the overwhelming love one feels for their child (no matter what age). For all of those readers who can only read in co-dependent, Oedipal, or Freudian themes into this book, you have missed the entire point and have hearts of stone! The fact is that the author Robert Munsch wrote this book as a tribute to his TWO still-born children and that makes this story even more moving especially if you've lost a child or had a miscarriage. The story is an expression of imagining his kids and what they would have been like and how much he would have loved them their whole lives. I found this to be a very emotional and touching story (and I am not a sentimental woman at all). My 3-year-old, rough and tumble, only-loves-the-outside-and-trucks kind of boy really likes this story and has been requesting it for bedtime almost every night. He especially enjoys the verse that is the theme of the book, "I'll love you forever, I'll like you for always, as long as you're living, my baby you'll be." My son wants to hear us say that to him. And again to all those who wrote and thought that this book was "sick"; face it, you might not have liked how this book was portrayed, but you'll love your kids forever, no matter how old they'll get, and in spite of what they will do throughout the phases of their lives that might frustrate you. In fact, my husband likes this story so much that he plans to get it for his mother for Mother's Day. This is a must-have children's book!

'Love You Forever' is perhaps the most touching book I have ever read. The story is warm, humorous and quite moving. The illustrations are beautiful and add to the depth of the story. I highly recommend this book to anyone. Be warned that it will bring tears to your eyes and a lump to your throat as you read it for the first time. At other times it will make you roll over laughing... The illustrations are delightful. Anyone will feel that this story is about them. My other recommendation is a series of three books titled Why Some Cats are Rascals, Book 2

This is another one of those books I can't read without having to dab at my eyes. Any loving parent, or child of a loving parent, will recognize the overwhelming love the mother in this story feels for her son. When her son is a newborn, she rocks him and sings to him, "I'll love you forever, I'll like you for always, As long as I'm living my baby you'll be." When he's asleep, she rocks him and sings him that song through each stage of his childhood. When he's a grown man with his own home, she drives over to his house with a ladder, makes sure he is fast asleep, climbs through his bedroom window, then rocks him and sings to him (my husband thinks this is a little strange, but I'm convinced that there are plenty of mothers out there who would do the same if they thought they could get away with it).

The tears come when the mother gets sick, and can't finish the song. Her son then holds her in his lap, rocks her, and sings to her. Then he goes home, picks up his newborn daughter, and sings. The illustrations are a beautiful complement to the story. Not only does the son grow up, but the mother slowly grows older. Her house keeps its old-fashioned look, even down to the rotary phone on her bedside; his house is more modern, with up-to-date kitchen appliances. The mother has a striped cat that appears in several illustrations of the boy growing up. In his house, there is a kitten, that grows into a cat, that turns into a rather large, well-fed cat by the end of the story.

Not only am I sharing this book with my kids, but I gave my mom a copy for Mother's Day.

My daughter in law read this to her children from birth. Every night. They are 16 and 18 now. Hurricane Katrina came and in fleeing from the rising water, their mother was killed. We did not get her body back until Nov. 18. All this time we have been searching and grieving. For the memorial service my granddauther wrote the euolgy and started it with "I'll love you forever / I'll love you for always / As long as I'm living / My baby you'll be." My mom read this to me every night etc. And at the end, with everyone crying and hearts breaking, she read "I'll love you forever / I'll love you for always / As long as I'm living / My mommy you'll be." When she went to the flooded house recently she found the book, wet, nasty with mud, but she found the book she treasured to remember her mom.

OK I admit that Love You Forever is our family's favorite all-time story (with The Paperbag Princess a close runner-up!). Hearing Robert Munsch perform his stories is both funny and fun. Even though we sing Love You Forever with a different melody, his performance, without a doubt, pulls at the heart strings (especially when you hear the emotion so obvious in his voice). No one has yet taken this CD out of our CD player. We just keep hitting 'play' over and over again!

"Love You Forever", while a children's book, might perhaps exert the greatest emotional impact on adults, whether or not we are parents. Although many mothers have responded from the maternal perspective, the other obvious perspective is that of any child (i.e. you and me) - boy or girl - and the realization of the profound meaningfulness of unconditional love from one's mother, facilitated by the prospect of being able to return that level of caring in later years. As a man, I tend to imagine myself as the male in the story. Although I do have a 14-yo daughter, for me the most moving aspect, as stated above, is the anticipation (and for many, perhaps the re-enactment) of the passing of one's mother, which I believe many women respond to as well, assuming they also tend to place themselves in the role as child.

I'd like to quote from two pre-2000 Amazon reviews of this book:

"This book is just plain touching. How can a man put into words what only a Mom can understand?"

Again, the irony here, in my opinion, is that men should be exceedingly capable of being moved by this story, whether or not they have children of their own. It may be of interest to examine whether women and men tend to assume differential roles in this story when they read it (e.g., perhaps women react most often as the mother, whereas men respond most commonly as the child).

Second:

"I had Robert Munsch on my radio show and interviewed him about the book. The book was written to honor the 2 still births that his wife had in two years. In fact the book is dedicated to these two babies. When I asked him about the mother going across town with a ladder to see her son, he explained that it should not be taken literally but rather figuratively that a mother will always be there for love WHENEVER! Mr Munsch read the book on the air and we had a bank of 5 callers waiting to talk to him. None of them could because they were all in tears."

This tends to answer two questions. First, and quite presumably, the book was written primarily with the perspective of the mother in mind. Nevertheless, there can be no doubt as to the dual basis or motivation underlying Munsch's desire to write and publish this piece. Surely he was responding to emotions in the context of his relationship with his mother as well. Second, Munsch addresses the critical discrepancy between literal and figurative. In my opinion, the few negative reviews of this little book (note also the oddity that >80% of reviews are 5-star, <20% are 1-star, with essentially nothing in between) failed to appreciate this important nuance.

This book was given to me by my mother when I had a house-full of 4 children under the age of 4. I was busy, and set it aside for a day or two, until she said, " Read the book today, then call me." I read it, called her, and was told that she had terminal lung cancer. This book was the only way my mother could tell me how she felt about me. She was never one to be open about her feelings, and I honestly cannot remember her telling me she loved me, until the last 6 months of her life. By then I was over 35, and she started with this book.
I would recommend this book for any age, any gender. The love it speaks of is one we all need to remember, and share with those close to us, even if we have to do it by sharing this book.
Yes, there are a couple of extremes...climbing in her grown son's window?....but the message is one of importance. Read it.

From HAROLD and THE PURPLE CRAYON to ONE FISH TWO FISH RED FISH BLUE FISH, we've all had our share of crazy kids books read to us growing up. From the "stay out of trouble" morals of THE POKEY LITTLE PUPPY to the "shut up and eat your dinner" message of WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE, you might even learn a thing or two while you're at it. But after reading through LOVE YOU FOREVER by Robert Munsch and Sheila McGraw, I have to say that it's one of the creepiest kids books I've ever seen.

Published in 1986, it's a fairly modern kids book, but with over 50 printings in the last 15 years, there's obviously millions of homes that have this mind bending tome within.

On the surface, it's a really sweet book about a mother who really loves her baby boy as he grows to manhood, no matter how goofy or annoying he may be in the process. Periodically she visits him and sings the song:

"I'll love you forever,
I'll like you for always,
As long as I'm living
my baby you'll be."

If it were just that, it'd be an all time classic. But it takes the simple concept to disturbing extremes that have to be seen to be believed.

Anyone who's had a baby in their family knows there's nothing cuter than looking at them while they're sleeping. The mother in the book knows this and sneaks into his room at night to peek at her angel, and sing her little song to him. Nothing wrong with that, right?

Only it doesn't stop there. When the boy is a teenager she CRAWLS into his room on all fours and, "If he was really asleep she picked up that great big boy and rocked him back and forth, back and forth, back and forth" while she sang her song. I don't know about you but if I was 15 and woke up in my bed with my Mom holding me like that, I'd probably scream. Who knows what kind of weird dreams this poor boy was having?

Well at least when this poor lad moves out of the house, he won't have to deal with his mother's obsessive habits anymore...or does he? Yep, once he's full grown, according to the book, "...sometimes on dark nights his mother got into her car and drove across town." YIKES! Not only is that scarier than hell that she's driving with a ladder strapped to her car in the middle of the night, but she makes a regular habit of it.

Yep, ol' Mommy climbs up his house, crawls through his window and does the same thing. Man this guy sleeps better than anyone I've ever known! Well, you can see by looking at this small single bed that he never got married. And he had such a healthy upbringing, too. It's a shame!

Though the book takes a poignant dramatic turn when he hears his mother isn't doing well and he goes to visit her. As he holds his dying mother in his lap, he turns the tables and sings the song to her. But wait a minute! I thought he was asleep during all those other times. Looks like he was playing along with this little sick little game a little too eagerly.

At this point, you feel bad for making fun of the book at all 'cause his mother has passed away. The son returns home, though, and picks up his baby girl and sings the song to her.

But from everything we've seen in the book, the guy lives alone. The only woman he ever sees at night is his Mom. Leaving the only possible mother of his child to be...OH MY GOD!!!

Let's all cross our fingers and pray we don't see the sequel to this book.

If you still think this book is sweet and that I'm missing the true spirit of LOVE YOU FOREVER, just switch the genders of the characters in this story and tell me that wouldn't be extra creepy.

I know many people love this book, but I am definitely not one of them. I almost like the sing-song refrain ("I'll love you forever, I'll like you for always..."), but when I read this book, I can't help thinking the mother should be institutionalized. Crawling across her son's floor? Stalking her adult son? Really! And even that refrain, "as long as I'm living my baby you'll be"--isn't she supposed to raise her son to be an adult, not her "baby"? I read this book to my son a few times, but it has since been put away. It gives me the creeps.