Miro in the Kingdom of the Sun

"Naupa pacha" ("Once upon a time"), a prince was born to the Sun King in the great city of Cuzco in the ancient Incan kingdom of Peru. At the same time in a mountain home far away a girl named Miro was born who raced with her brothers, cared for the llamas living on the grasslands, and learned the language of the wild birds. But while Miro grows strong the young prince grows weak and the priests tell the Sun King that only if the prince drinks water from the lake at "pachap cuchun cuchun," one of the corners of the earth, can he be saved. Miro's brothers, swift runners, search for the lost lake, but they fail to find it, leaving it to their sister to try and save the life of the young prince.Jane Kurtz came across an Inca folktale "The Search for the Magic Lake" while preparing for a trip to Central America. Originally told to Genevieve Barlow by descendants of the Inca Indians in Ecuador and retold in her 1966 book "Latin American Folktales." Kurtz keeps the plot of the original story but develops the main character in the Miro of this version of the tale. "Miro in the Kingdom of the Sun" also works in details about how people in the Inca Empire lived before 1532, which was the year when Francisco Pizarro and his Spanish soldiers killed the last king of the Incas. With colorful woodcuts by David Frampton the story of "Miro in the Kingdom of the Sun" provides a lyrical retelling of a folktale from a long vanished culture. It has the feel of an ancient story, where magic allows young Miro to survive the obstacles that stand between her and the lost lake, and is rich in cultural detail that most young readers will not be able to appreciate, although certainly Kurtz turns Miro into more of a modern heroine than we would have seen in the original version of the tale.

Jane Kurtz enriches this Inca folktale with details of pre-Colonial Incan life, creating a book which will find enthusiastic audiences among those choosing books for pleasure and teachers and students studying the Inca, as well. The author's beautiful prose is enhanced by David Frampton's richly hued woodcuts, creating a memorable story of a strong heroine in a lost culture