The Snail House

I'm a graduate student in Boise Idaho. I'm in an Advanced Children's Literature class and I've been asked to write a review of a newer children's book for this website. I chose The Snail House by Allan Ahlberg and illustrated by Gillian Tyler. This is a story about a Grandmother telling a fantasy to her grandchildren. All of my grandparents are deceased, but as a child my grandmother used to tell us stories. This is much of the reason that I chose this story. It sort of brought me back to my childhood. The book starts out with Michael, Hannah, and the baby. They all climb onto Grandmother's lap to hear the story of a boy and his sister and their baby brother who suddenly become so tiny that nobody can see them. They decide to leave their home to live for a little while in a home that fit their new size. This home was a snail house. They have everything they could possible need; a door, windows, a kitchen, tables and chairs-everything. In this house which is also a moving house they have a number of adventures; an earthquake, the baby disappearing, and the thrush who would like to eat their house. Along with this wonderful story told by Grandmother are enchanting illustrations that draw the reader further into the story. This is a great read for the ages of 4 to 10, however I'm 27 and I enjoyed it immensely.

."The Snail House" will take everybody back to that safe warm world, where you sat on Grandma's knee and had stories told to you.It is both a fantasy and a reality for children to see the world around them at different size scales. This might have something to do with little person's low-eyelevel perspective. Most young children play in a miniaturised world, Little boys with the toy cars and trains, or little girls with their baby dolls. Playing on the floor or out in the garden, small things look large, and big things look huge. In this story, Grandma transports the children to a world where they live in a snail's shell house. They have three adventures. The great earthquake when the apple fell; baby gets lost when she climbs the dandelion; and the day the thrush almost got their snail but was scared away by a cat.One of the charms of the book, is the way the children interrupt their Grandma as she tells the story, and ask questions and make suggestions. Does that sound familiar?We are never that far from the real world. On each page, outside the frames that contain Grandma's story we see the children with their grandmother or shown scenes close by her house. We are reminded that traffic is humming on the distant road and "headlights are gleaming in the gathering dark".This is one of those rare picturebooks where the story and illustrations mesh perfectly. The story within the story is a neat device, perfectly matched and supported by the illustrations, which show both the "real world" at Grandma's house and the "story book" micro-world of the adventures with the snail.Gillian Tyler's portrayal of the miniature scenes in the garden is superb. The details and activities going on beyond the written story will intrigue and capture the attention of all youngsters.There is just a hint of mystery in the story. In the last scene, we see young Hannah out on the verandah "standing yet, gazing into the muffled blackness of the garden". "The Snail House" shows us that gentle, lyrical writing, and charming and soft but detailed pictorials still have an important part to play in making a children's picture book work successfully. It is a refreshing change from a lot of the garishly, overly styled, supposedly smart and sometimes very cynical children's books that we often see.