Now that I’ve either offended or convinced you all that I’ve gone off the deep end (or perhaps both) I thought I would change gears and do someting a little different.   I’ve been wanting to start doing book reviews for awhile now, and now seems like a good time to start.  I always enjoy reading book reviews on the blogs I read, so I might as well do it too.

This afternoon I finished reading outloud <a href=”http://www.amazon.com/Story-King-Arthur-Kingfisher-Epics/”>The Story of King Arthur</a>, retold by Robin Lister (Kingfisher Epics) and we really enjoyed it.  It read outloud well, and while it was a retelling it was definitely not a dumbed down version with simplified vocabulary. This book is definitely not <a href=”http://members.aol.com/BeeME1/bookstore.html”>twaddle,</a>! The author gracefully handled the more unseemly parts of the story (for example, Mordred and Galahad’s conceptions) quite well by not skipping them entirely but also not going into too much detail.  He (she? I have no idea and Google was no help) did an excellent job condensing the sweeping scope of the story into a very readable and approachable narrative.

The story was a little challenging for Emma (who just turned five) but she listened to the whole thing as if spell-bound.  It was definitely just the thing for my little Arthurian obsessed girl who was hankering for something a bit more meaty and in depth to complement the (excellent) Tales of King Arthur illustrated books by Hudson Talbott that we have been checking out from the library.