My children enjoy books (most children do, right?). We have all kinds of books for our children – new stories, treasured picture books from my childhood, classic stories and readers. I am always drawn to older books. The vintage illustrations with their soothing colors are a delight to look at. Kinder Cottage Publishing has re-published a series of Peter Rabbit stories from the early 1900’s with just that sort of illustration I love. We have enjoyed reading two of them – Peter Rabbit’s Birthday ($4) and When Peter Rabbit Went to School ($4). Each is a small (5″x7″) book with full-color illustrations.
Peter Rabbit’s Birthday (#7 in the series) tells of the adventures (and troubles) that Peter has leading up to his birthday party. He sets off to invite his friends to his party – and is typical of Peter gets himself into trouble along the way. We were introduced to some new-to-us characters and saw familiar friends as well. When Peter is visiting a mama cat and her kittens, she is knitting mittens. My daughter was so excited that they were the same characters from a familiar rhyme.
When Peter Rabbit went to School (#8 in the series) begins first with Peter falling into the well at Mr. McGregor’s barnyard. Due to the mischief Peter finds himself in, his mother decides to send him and his sisters to school. Of course, Peter has mis-adventures here as well. There are instances throughout the story that reference happenings from previous stories. Not that they detract from this story, it stands perfectly fine on its own. It has led to my daughter (the six-year old) wanting to have all the books from the series. These are definitely her books – she has written her name in them and everything. *grin* My oldest daughter (13) is also taken with them, for the illustrations. She has copied some and used them as inspiration for her own drawings.
There are ten little hard-backed books ($30) in this series that appeals most to younger children (ages 3-9). All of the stories were originally published in America between 1917 and 1922 by the Henry Altemus Company. The current publisher, Kinder Cottage Publishing, has done some minor editing. One of the things we enjoy in reading older books is the language. We are very happy to see that this has been preserved. I do however wish some of the formatting for each page had been improved. Too often, a sentence is continued on the next page. This makes it a bit difficult when reading aloud. My daughter felt the story was a bit tedious and became distracted and fidgety, though surprisingly, her four year old brother was less restless. It took around 15 minutes to read (we keep track for our reading charts) which isn’t that long. When we first read these, she asked to stop about two-thirds through. Now, we stop approximately in the middle and finish later in the day. Happy children! The two titles we have are 55-60 pages.
The Schoolhouse Review Crew families have reviewed a range of titles from this Peter Rabbit series. Be sure to check out some of the other stories and the Crew members’ thoughts!
