bilbopooh's Full Review: James Marshall - Red Riding Hood
James Marshall is one of my favorite author-illustrators. Coupling masterfully clever, brief tales with wickedly witty illustrations, he left a legacy of dozens of books. Most are original stories, but some tackle the classics. His take on Goldilocks and the Three Bears is hilarious, mostly because of the zany, richly detailed illustrations. Red Riding Hood is amusing enough, but it doesn't quite live up to the gold Marshall standard.
Kind, considerate, naive Red Riding Hood lives with her mother on the edge of the deep, dark woods. When her mom whips up a delicious custard for Red's granny, who is feeling under the weather, the child is more than happy to make the trek through the forest to deliver the treat. Seeing her off are cats; I count at least nine of them, though there are probably more, as Marshall has them peeking out of just about every conceivable hiding place.
The cats are an addition, as is the fact that Granny is a voracious reader. It's also rather silly, I suppose, to have Red picking a bouquet of sunflowers for her grandmother, since they are such cumbersome flowers, and to show her being accosted by yet another dubious stranger after the whole wolf business is over with.
Generally, though, this strikes me as a pretty straightforward retelling of the story, with the text rarely deviating from the expected and the pictures, appealing as they are with the combination of ink and watercolor and Marshall's impressive artistic skills, offering few terribly surprising details. That's all well and good, but I'm so used to Marshall making me laugh out loud, I get a little disappointed when that doesn't happen.
Red Riding Hood is just as good a version of the fairy tale as any basic rendition, so go ahead and pick it up if you're in it for the story. But if you want an example of Marshall's sparkling humor, I'd look elsewhere.
A thoroughly modern, thoroughly charming retelling of the old favorite. Witty and direct . . . both Granny and child are swallowed, then rescued intac...More at Buy.com Marketplaces
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