Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm

Philip has faithfully translated this collection of the Grimm Brothers' anthology of oral folktales. He has chose to include twenty of the classic German tales in this beautiful edition. Hardcover, with gilted pages, and metallic highlights in the illustrations creates a very stunning picture. Philip has selected some of the most well known favorites, but also a few that modern times have forgotten. The reading level is approximately third grade, though the stories look as though they would be better understood and more entertaining if read aloud. There tends to be just one illustration per story. While they are wonderfully done and framed with more artwork, they don't do much to tell the plot of the story and are not always matched up with the text. Every classroom should have a collection of Grimm's fairy tales, but this isn't the one. This book seems to have been designed more for collectors and to sit on a shelf than to be handled by youngsters on a daily basis in a classroom environment.Why 4 stars?:This is not a book to be read, but one to be collected and set upon a shelf to collect dust. The illustrations are beautiful and the information provided about the tales and the brothers is excellent. However, this book was not made for children to read their favorite tales from.