The Story Giant - Softcover

Patten, Brian

4.3

155 ratings by Goodreads

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0007119437 ISBN 13: 9780007119431

Publisher: HarperCollinsChildren’sBooks, 2004

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A magical story that weaves together fifty world tales, by a renowned poet, and illustrated by 2002 Greenaway Medal winner Chris Riddell.

‘One day a story fell from heaven and landed on a giant’s tongue... ’

The Story Giant is a master illusionist and the ur-storyteller. In his memory exists every tale ever told in the world – except for one, which has eluded him for millennia.

In a last desperate attempt to track down this lost tale, he draws four children from the different corners of the globe into his castle while they sleep, there to exchange the tales they know from their own cultures, to see if between them they can piece together the elusive missing story. For if he cannot track it down and install it in his memory, the whole facade of the castle will crumble and fall, and the Story Giant himself will die. And if he does, so will all the stories, and the world will be a poorer, duller, grimmer place.

Fifty tales are told within this magical framework in Brian Patten’s inimitable style – from Brer Rabbit to the tale of how St George killed the Dragon (except it wasn’t St George – it was his mother, with a pudding...) but none of them is the missing tale. The castle falls; the giant dies. But all is not lost – the four children dream themselves back to the ruins to concoct the missing tale themselves...

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Review:

� Every child in the land should be given this book, a true gift book if ever there was one!
Fiona Waters Books for Keeps

� A wonderful book of traditional tales from many cultures. This extraordinary book, is packed with dreams, magic and stories, and comes with evocative line drawings from Chris Riddell. Wendy Cooling, The Bookseller

� a wonderful variation on The Arabian Nights and a book that can be used for many age groups
Lyn Gardner, Guardian

� The book is a beautiful package
Nicolette Jones, Sunday Times

� Patten’s poetic multi-layered narrative offers a thoughtful child an exploration of the meaning of fiction, along with some outlook-changing stories.
Independent

From the Publisher:

This was Sunday Times' Children's Book Of The Week.

' a wonderful anthology in which fables from Aesop rub shoulders with Arabic folklore, Irish fairy tales, Australian aboriginal legends and Japanese myths. The tales are punctuated by conversations between the children, which remind us that stories occurring in one part of the world can also have mysteriously arisen in distant places, in other times. .. The tales, although all entertaining, communicate the pointlessness of war and are lessons in how to make the most of life. The book is a beautiful package, to which Chris Riddell brings has characteristic quirkiness, spookiness and charm. Patten, you can tell, loves these stories, and loves the idea of stories. By repeating them, he seeks, like the giant, to keep them alive.

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