Snow White and Rose Red - Hardcover

Cooney, Barbara

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0385301766 ISBN 13: 9780385301763

Publisher: Delacorte Books for Young Readers, 1991

Synopsis

A bear, befriended by two sisters during the winter, returns one day to reward them royally for their kindness

About this title

About the Author

Ruth Sanderson is the highly acclaimed illustrator of over seventy five books for children. Her fairy tale retellings include Cinderella, Goldilocks, The Snow Princess, and The Twelve Dancing Princesses. Her original fairy tale, The Enchanted Wood, won both the Young Hoosier Award and the Bank Street College Award. The Texas Bluebonnet Award was given to her retelling of The Golden Mare, The Firebird, and The Magic Ring. Ruth lives with her husband in Easthampton, Massachusetts.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

There once was a poor widow who lived in a little cottage by the woods. In her front garden grew two beautiful, intertwining rose bushes, one with white flowers, the other with red. The widow’s two daughters were just like the rose bushes – different, but equally lovely.
 
Snow White’s hair was white like the stars, while Rose Red’s hair was as dark as the space between them. Snow White was quiet and gentle, while Rose Red was loud and lively. Snow White preferred to sit cozily indoors and read while Rose Red liked to romp in the meadows and sing. But both girls were helpful, grateful and loving and never thought badly of anyone or anything. They loved each other so much that they always held hands when they walked together. When Snow White asked, “Will we ever leave each other?” Rose Red answered, “Not as long as we shall live.”
 
When they went into the woods to pick berries, they never feared the animals, for they had made friends with all of them. They fed rabbits clover from their hands. Deer grazed beside them, and birds perched on their shoulders and sang songs. If they stayed too long and it got dark, they would lie down beside each other and sleep on the moss until morning. Trusting and loving her girls, the widow never worried about them.
 
One morning when they awoke after sleeping overnight in the woods they saw before them a beautiful child in a pure white dress. The child stood silently and looked at them in a friendly way, then quickly disappeared into the forest. Looking around they discovered they had been sleeping right next to a cliff and surely would have plunged over it if they had walked any further in the dark. When they told their mother about it, she said the child must have been the angel who protects good children.
 
On winter nights, the girls would sit by the fireplace and sew while their mother read aloud. One stormy night, they were startled by a loud thumping at the door.
“Rose Red, please open it,” said their mother. “It must be a traveler seeking shelter.”
Rose Red hurried to the door, expecting to see some poor soul. But when a black bear stuck his head inside, she screamed and backed away. Snow White ran and hid under her mother’s bed and Rose Red followed.

About this edition

• Publisher: Delacorte Books for Young Readers
• Publication date: 1991
• ISBN 10: 0385301766
• ISBN 13: 9780385301763
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 48