Celebrate Valentine’s Day with your children by showing them how special they are to you. Gifting books is a simple way to share your love because it allows you to spend time with them while reading aloud and snuggling and the books last forever. Check out all the Valentine’s Day books, HERE.
TEN-WORD TINY TALES OF LOVE
By: Joseph Coelho
Illustrated by: 21 Various Artist Friends
Published: December 3, 2024
Publisher: Candlewick Press
Fiction
Can you tell a story in just ten words? You might not think so, but you can say a lot with just ten words. Joseph Coelho, former UK Children’s Laureate proves it. In TEN-WORD TINY TALES OF LOVE, he offers brief tales that share lots of love. From siblings to parent and child to animals there is all kinds of love to see in this book.
At the beginning, the author shares how the ten-word tiny tales came about. His first came to him thanks to his loving cat Minko who comforted him when he was sad. The second came in a card. For this book, he wanted to share the love by using 21 of his favorite illustrators to create their illustrated imagination of his ten-word tiny tale. The illustrations are varied, inventive, and so creative in how each of them envisioned the tale. It was fun to even recognize several of the illustrators and their styles.
One of my favorites was a tale of sibling love illustrated by Sydney Smith. While the brothers wait for the rain to stop, the older brother teaches his younger brother to tie his shoelaces.
“As it poured,
he taught him
to tie his laces.
Another favorite shares a brother telling his little sister a bedtime story. Yet another features a girl floating towards the stage while listening to her favorite band. Each tale and illustration is unique and special.
The end of the book offers lessons in writing a ten-word tiny tale and then taking the tale and lengthening it into a story. Steps and questions to ask to flush out the imagination are included. This book would make a great lesson builder in a creative writing class or a way to teach writing in an elementary classroom.
Joseph Coelho, former UK Children’s Laureate, is an award-winning poet, playwright, and children’s book author who wrote this book’s companion title, Ten-Word Tiny Tales: To Inspire and Unsettle. His first poetry collection, Werewolf Club Rules, won the CLPE Poetry Award in 2015. His picture books include If All the World Were . . . , illustrated by Allison Colpoys, and Luna Loves Library Day, illustrated by Fiona Lumbers. He is also the author of the Fairy Tales Gone Bad trilogy, illustrated by Freya Hartas, and The Boy Lost in the Maze, illustrated by Kate Milner. Originally from London, Joseph Coelho now lives in Folkestone, England.
Illustrators include: Sydney Smith, Katherine Child, Mark Janssen, Natalia Shaloshvili, Jarvis, Fiona Lumbers, Katie May Green, Heather Kilgour, Victoria Turnbull, Ken Wilson-Max, Myo Yim, Bob Graham, Diane Ewen, Steve McCarthy, Jon Klassen, Baljinder Kaur, Mini Grey, Fruzsina Czech, Rikin Parekh, Jim Field, and Beth Suzanna
To purchase a copy of TEN-WORD TINY TALES OF LOVE, click HERE.
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Thanks to the publisher for sending a copy of this book for the purpose of this review. This review is my honest opinion. If you choose to make a purchase through the above links, I may receive a small commission without you having to pay a cent more for your purchase.
Posted Under Bajinder Kaur, Beth Suzanna, Bob Graham, Book Review, Children's books, Diane Ewen, fiction, Fruzsina Czech, Heather Kilgour, Jarvis, Jim Field, Jon Klassen, Joseph Coelho, Katherine Child, Katie May Green, Ken Wilson-Max, Love, Mark Janssen, Mini Grey, Myo Yim, Natalia Shaloshvili, poetry, Rikin Parekh, Steve McCarthy, Sydney Smith, Valentine's Day, Victoria Turnbull