What were all those fairy-tale characters thinking? Jane Yolen and Rebecca Kai Dotlich answer this question in paired poems, with sometimes startling results. The Princess claims all those mattresses kept her awake—not a silly pea—while the poor pea complains that the princess snores. One Snow White begs the witch to settle by the bay and throw that mirror away. Another boldly tells the mirror she "won't be guided by a glass that's so one-sided." Grumbles from the Forest is a bewitching brew of voices—grumbling, pleading, bragging, reminiscing, confiding—that bubbles with magic and wonder. The spectacular paintings that tie the poems together are full of surprise and intrigue. This stunning collection includes end notes that briefly describe the tales and their history and an introduction that invites readers to imagine their own poems from unusual perspectives.

The classic nursery rhymes we know and love--upside-down, backward, in gibberish, and fresh out of bounds--as only Jon Scieszka could stage them Mother knows best, but sometimes a little nonsense wins the day. Inspired by Dadaism's rejection of reason and rational thinking, and in cahoots with Blanche Fisher Wright's The Real Mother Goose, this anthology of absurdity unravels the fabric of classic nursery rhymes and stitches them back together (or not quite together) in every clever way possible. One by one, cherished nursery rhymes--from "Humpty Dumpty" to "Hickory Dickory Dock," "Jack Be Nimble" to "Mother Hubbard"--fall prey to sly subversion as master of fracture Jon Scieszka and acclaimed illustrator Julia Rothman refashion them into comics strips, errant book reports, anagrams, and manic mash-ups. Playfully reconstructed, the thirty-six old-new rhymes invite further baloney, bringing kids in on the joke and inviting them to revel in reimagining. Featuring robust back matter, this irreverent take on the rhymes of childhood is a great gift for child readers and a rich classroom resource across grade levels, and a is a love song to a living language.