The Three Bears ABC

February 25, 2013
The story of Goldilocks and the Three Bears gets an abecedarian twist, courtesy of Maccarone and Hibbert. Goldilocks, who has bronzed skin and wavy blonde hair, approaches the bears’ home when they are away: “H is for house. Goldilocks saw the bears’ happy house in the forest. I is for inside, where Goldilocks went.” Ample alliteration helps underscore the alphabet concept, but Hibbert’s digital illustrations are oddly soft-edged and fuzzy; it’s almost like watching a 3D movie without the glasses—slightly dizzying. Despite the novel structure of this retelling, the prose has a flatness that drains the story of any real excitement, and Goldilocks’s interactions with the bears provide no real surprises. Ages 4–7.

March 15, 2013
Preschool-G Goldilocks and the Three Bears gets the concept-book treatment in this alphabetical retelling. Starting with A is for alphabet to set the stageand finishing with Z is for zany . . . because it was that kind of day, the familiar fairy tale is strung along from letter to letter. The format works reasonably well. Maccarone is able to fit the story within the parameters of an alphabet book without including too many connections that feel like placeholders (one such placeholder: I is for inside, where Goldilocks goes ) until she reaches a more suitable letter. The cartoonlike illustrations have the appearance of animation stills and reinforce the text, telling the story from the point of view of the bears, who are more bemused than angry. While this book neither revolutionizes the alphabet book nor turns the fairy tale on its head, it straddles the two genres with enough success that it should appeal to fans of both.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2013, American Library Association.)