Hansel And Gretel - Softcover

Kindergarten-Grade 3. This modified version of the classic tale has the feel of an impromptu bedtime story. The awful stepmother is the next-door neighbor, who looks like a Lane Smith creation. The Disneyesque witch is a humongous food-lover named Glut Annie Stout (note the initials) who spends her days baking and eating, using the children as her clean-up crew. When she locks Hansel in the pantry, Gretel shoves Glut Annie into the larder, phones 911, and has the fat lady arrested by the police for "kidnapping, being mean to children, and eating an entire smorgasbord without a license." The children are returned to their loving father, who opens a successful health food store. The tale is so infused with DeLuise's own personality that adult readers might well envision him reciting it aloud. Garish is a fit descriptor for both the story and the art. Text appears within illustrations, in colored boxes (some surrounded by contrasting striped borders), in conversation balloons, and as asides in large colored letters near the bottom of some pages. Every scene is filled with brightly colored, heavily detailed cartoon images, but much of the humor in the pictures will be lost on children. Like the gingerbread house, this book has little appeal once you get inside.?Susan Scheps, Shaker Heights Public Library, OH
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