The Golden Sandal: A Middle Eastern Cinderella Story

The golden sandal by Rebecca Hickhox Once there was a girl and her mom died when she was little, so there neigheior maired the dad. So then Maha goes and takes the fish and home. Then she lets one go then her mom gets mad at her. Then she gets clothes from the fish for a ball. Later she gets to sit by the wife because they think she is rich. The next day they find her shoe. Then the man goes to her house and she is locked up in a jailhouse and they hear screaming and they open the door and the sandal fits her. The theme of this story is Good versus Evil because her stepmother is being mean to her and she gets to marry the Prince and Good wins. The message of this book is `Don't judge a book by its cover', because they think she is ugly but she is not. The genre of this book is fantasy fiction because there is no such thing as a fairy godmother. The audience of this book is for people who are having problems with their families because Cindy has problems with her family. I like the setting in Iraq because it is usually suppose to be somewhere we don't know about. I love the fairy Godmother because it is suppose to be a fairy, but it is a fish. I love the trickery because the fairy Godfish told the little girl to take a gold coin out of his mouth and pretend she sold it. I love the characters because they don't live a normal life. I love the bad guys because they are really funny. I like the illustrations because they are really cool.

"The Golden Sandal: A Middle Eastern Cinderella Story" is based on the Iraqi folktale of "The Little Red Fish and the Clog of Gold" retold by Rebecca Hickox with illustrations by Will Hillenbrand. Cinderella in this case is a young girl named Maha. Her widowed father is a fisherman who has to be away from home often so Maha has been wishing for him to remarry the kindly neighbor lady who has a daughter of her own. Maha gets her wish, but in the great tradition of such characters her stepmother makes her do all the work and only lets her eat dried dates. Then one day Maha throws a red fish back into the water, sparing its life, and the wish tells her "call for me any time and ask what you will." So it is that the magic fish helps Maha prepare for the big event in town, the Grand Henna and shows her stepsister the penalty for trying to be mean to Maha. Then there is Tariq, the brother of a rich merchant, who finds the golden sandal and searchers for its owner. Obviously the attraction here is not only the unique variation on the familiar Cinderella theme but the fact that this is an Iraqi story, since "The Golden Sandal" clearly shows that there are some things American kids have in common with Iraqi kids even when a glass slipper becomes a golden sandal. Hillenbrand works in some nice Middle Eastern architecture into his art along with the strategic use of the color red. In the back of the book both the author and the illustrator explain how there research of this story informed the telling and the illustrating of the tale. If you like variations on the familiar Cinderella theme look out for Nina Jaffe's "The Way Meat Loves Salt: A Cinderella Tale from the Jewish Tradition," Ai-Ling Louie's "Yeh-shen, a Cinderella Tale from China," and Penny Pollock's "Turkey Girl: A Zuni Cinderella," which are just a few of the many versions out there. "The Golden Sandal" is one of the better of these tales out there and it has the added virtue of being timely given world events.

This is a Cinderella type story that takes place in the middle east. It takes some tradional customs and places them in a context that is easy for the western student to understand. A great book for fans of Cinderella, too.

Their are not that many books for Middle Eastern students. A Cinderella book was sorely missing and this one will please my students immensely.