Ant and Grasshopper

I researched different versions of this story and I loved the illustrations of this book as well as how it was told. It is lengthy to hold the attention of a younger audience, but I'd still recommend this version over others.

I purchased this book for my 7 yr old niece because it is in the library in her school & is her favorite. She loved it!

This is not the classic version of the fable. This version is so totally politically correct it made me sad. The moral of the fable is to PREPARE for the hard times in life that will come to all of us at one point or another. In this offering the little tikes are assured that Mummy and Daddy(government?/any body?) will launch a rescue of the wantonly unprepared. Oh what a surprise it must be to Ms. Luli Gray (the author) that even top notch fiddle players and dare I say writers, should lay by provisions for the rainy days in their lives. On the positive side the Illustrations by Giuliano Ferri are wonderful. Anybody for Robinson Cursoe ? NO his dog DIES! How about a rework of Treasure Island Ms. Gray? The I sure you could work out a plot that would involve negotiating with the pirates! What have we wrought? Sigh...

It is a sign of the times when a book can be titled "the Grass Hopper and the Ant" a story well known for teaching the rewards of the principled hard work and in fact tell a story of a miserly rich unhappy ant that learns to sing and dance from an undisciplined homeless by choice grass hopper. And then be marketed and sold at a reputable book retailer like Amazon. The lesson I got was next time I purchase a classic children's book from Amazon with a familiar title like say "Beauty and the Beast". I will do the work of making sure that the tile is what's in it. So when I share it with my family I am not embarrassed by the fraudulent content and expose them to something quite different then represented by the tile. =) Revisionist Crap Save Your Money

We love this book!

If you buy this book to teach your child the importance of hard work and planning ahead you are in for a big disappointment! Instead of the Grasshopper learning the virtues of hard work and planning ahead, the ant is presented as greedy, lacking an appreciation of the arts and needing to learn how to share. That's right the hard-working ant, the hero of the original, NEEDS TO LEARN HOW TO SHARE?!?!?!With subversions like this, how can we hope to teach our children the importance of working hard to build a life for themselves and their families?

For Church library. section

Our six year old loves this book! We have been renting it from our library every fall for the last three years and finally decided to buy our own copy. The story is very sweet and lovingly illustrates the importance of hard work, but also the necessity to stop and smell the roses and help those in need. The "Here We Come a Waffling" song inside is a bit corny, but our kid absolutely loves it. This is one of those books that parents won't mind reading over and over again. Highly recommend.

Great book to show children that each individual has strengths and is valuable to our community and our differences are what make us special