Description

Break-in at the Three Bears family home?  It could only be one dame.  Wicked witch gone missing from her candied cottage?  Hansel and Gretel claim it was self-defense.  Did Humpty Dumpty really just fall off that wall, or was he pushed?  Here are five fairy-tale stories with a twist, all told from the point of view of a streetwise police officer called Binky, who just happens to be a toad in a suit and a fedora.  When Snow White doesn't make it to the beauty pageant, Officer Binky is the first to find the apple core lying by her bed.  When an awful giant mysteriously crashes to the ground, upsetting the whole town, Binky discovers exactly who is responsible.  Author David Levinthal and illustrator John Nickle retell these classic stories in the style of a 1940s noir detective novel—for kids! 

About the Author

Writing in the "New York Times", Charles Hagen said that, "What distinguishes Mr. Levinthal's work is his interest in emotionally charged historical material.  But the real force of his images comes not from his choice of subjects but from the way he tells their stories."  Levinthal is the co-author, with Garry Trudeau, of "Hitler Moves East, "originally published in 1977.  Dark Light, a ten-year survey exhibition of his work, was organized in 1994 by The Photographers' Gallery in London, and traveled throughout the United Kingdom.  In 1997 the International Center of Photography in New York presented the first retrospective "David Levinthal Work from 1977 to 1996."  He has received a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship and a Guggenheim Fellowship.  His work is included in numerous museum collections including the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Museum of Modern Art, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Gene Autry Western Heritage Museum, and The Menil Collection. 

John Nickle is the illustrator of Judi Barrett's "Things That Are Most in the World, " as well as the author and illustrator of "TV Rex, Alphabet Explosion!:  Search and Count from Alien to Zebra, " and "The Ant Bully".  He lives in Brooklyn, New York.  Learn more about him at JohnNickle.net. 

Praise For…

The New York Times, August 23, 2012:"That’s the way the nursery rhyme crumbles in these humorous retellings, cast in the world of hard-boiled crime and private detectives." 

The Huffington Post, August 6, 2012:"The first children's book from the wildly creative Levinthal and I hope it won't be the last." 

Booklist, September 15, 2012:"Kids will certainly be familiar with all these stories, and Levinthal supplies just enough of a twist with each one to make them fresh again without necessarily reinventing any of them.  What’ll really stop kids in their tracks, though, is Nickle’s acrylic artwork.  His sophisticated touch is as equally suited to the dramatic, black-andwhite re-creations of the crimes as it is to the cheeky scenes of Binky gumshoeing about with various woodland creatures." 

School Library Journal, September 2012:"The tongue-in-cheek telling of tales will tickle the fancies of children familiar with the originals."