Poems bewitched and haunted Book

While trying to think of a gift to bring three-and-three-quarters Griffin and his mom next week, I realized that the set of Jack Prelutsky/Peter Sis fantasy poetry books would be perfect.

It's too bad that the publisher's blurb for this doesn't contain an excerpt of the actual poetry from this collection. It is fantastic read-aloud stuff: funny, rhythmic and even "big" words to help build vocabulary and spark conversation. Several of the poems made me laugh out loud. Of course, I think Peter Sis is a genius with his brightly colored illustrations and bizarre flights of fancy. Despite the title, this collection seemed to have more poetry about ogres, wizards and witches than poems about the trolls. The title poem seemed to be one of the least in collection. My favorite poem was "Underfoot," about "the least of the trolls, no bigger than a bug," because it struck me as a clever twist on the warning to children that they not "get underfoot." This poem also has one of my favorite advanced vocabulary lines: Underfoot claims that his blood is "liquid anthracite."

Personally, I didn't like Monday's Troll as much as The Dragons Are Singing Tonight, but that's because I am partial to dragons in general. Even so, I still hope Griffin's mom lets me do the first reading!