Meet Hunca Munca (First Board Book, Potter)

In this segment of Potter's "Tale of Two Bad Mice," mice Hunca Munca and her husband Tom Thumb explore a dolls' house whose dolls are away and steal some of the contents for themselves. On board pages.

ea. vol: illus. by author. unpaged. (World of Peter Rabbit Series). Warne. 1986. BD $2.95. LC number unavailable. PreS Beatrix Potter for toddlersversions of four of the tales in board book form that are intended to introduce babies to the stories. Unfortunately, the texts are so shortened and simplified as to be unrecognizable. . . .Hunca Munca and . . .Tom Kitten are the most faithful to characters and action. . . .Peter Rabbit has the good little bunnies eating their supper of bread and milk and blackberries before Peter visits Mr. McGregor's garden. There is no mention of the sandy-whiskered gentleman in . . .Jemima Puddleduck, and the story is entirely absent as well; instead, Jemima's brother and his wife are imported from another story. The illustrations, five or six per book, are faithfully reproduced, although the colors have a washed-out look. Those chosen for . . .Hunca Munca and . . .Tom Kitten convey the skeletons of the tales by themselves. . . .Peter Rabbit has none of the action scenes from the garden. As addled as its main character, . . .Jemima Puddleduck is a portrait of the Puddleduck family, with pictures taken from several of the tales, and the text completely unrelated to the original. For real Beatrix Potter fanseven very small onesthere's no substitute for the child-sized originals (even if toddlers can't chew on them). Lucy Young Clem, Evansville-Vanderburgh County Public Library, Ind.
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