Child of Faerie, Child of Earth - Hardcover

Yolen, Jane

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0316968978 ISBN 13: 9780316968973

Publisher: Little, Brown Young Readers, 1997

Synopsis

According to legend, once a year faeries leave the underworld to join a faerie ring in the moonlight, and on one such magical night, a young faerie boy meets a child of earth and they become friends forever.

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Reviews

Grade 1-3?On Hallow's Eve, "when widows grieve," a faerie boy and a mortal girl meet and briefly share one another's worlds. The human girl spends an enchanted night dancing and dining in elven halls, but refuses the faerie's offer to make her his queen. In turn, the boy with wings enjoys a day of barnyard activities and a midday meal with the child of earth but he chooses to return to his eldritch realm. However, they exchange tokens of their friendship before parting?a nourishing egg from her to him and an ethereal feather from him to her. They visit with one another "now and then" into old age. This gentle story of an unusual friendship is recounted in challenging vocabulary and melodic rhyme; careful phrasing favors neither earth nor faerie but paints evocative images of both. Dyer's watercolors completely fill the pages opposite the poetry and offer bucolic settings of sunlit golds and nocturnal blues for the sturdy, round-faced children. Share this one-on-one to encourage appreciation of the delicate details, such as the snippets of illustrations pulled from the full-page spreads to accompany the text. This simple tale is appropriate for a younger audience than this talented team's The Girl in the Golden Bower (Little, Brown, 1994), and will appeal to listeners willing to sacrifice drama for atmosphere.?Carol Ann Wilson, Westfield Memorial Library, NJ
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Ages 5^-8. On Halloween, when magic is in the air, a little girl encounters a fairy child who takes her to his magical world and pleads with her to stay. Knowing she doesn't belong, she refuses, convincing her fairy guide to return with her to her home and travel for a time "over the human road." Yolen adds some sweet details to a story with a familiar folktale ring, presenting all in pleasing poetry that slips easily off the tongue for reading aloud. Dyer's illustrations are a study in colorful contrast: the quaint, apple-cheeked girl with a circle of flowers in her hair; the fairy boy in diaphanous green with sun-dappled wings; a landscape bright with brilliant harvest colors; an enchanted hall "bedecked in candlelight." A story about a friendship that stretches across some unusual boundaries. Stephanie Zvirin

Edition details

• Publisher: Little, Brown Young Readers
• Publication date: 1997
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0316968978
• ISBN 13: 9780316968973
• Binding: Hardcover
• Illustrator: Dyer Jane
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 32