Book Review of Sylvester and the Magic Pebble by William Steig

 

1.      Bibliography

Steig, William. 2005. Sylvester and the Magic Pebble. Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers. ISBN: 9781416902065.

2.      Plot Summary

This adorable book is about a young donkey named Slyvester who loves to collect pebbles.  One day he finds a mysterious, red, glowing pebble and accidentally finds out that it is magic and can grant wishes!  Sylvester encounters a problem and wishes to become a rock.  No longer able to hold the magic pebble he cannot wish himself back and stays a rock for a long time.  This book shows the grief of parents who have lost and child and have no answers as to where he might be.  Finally reuniting with his parents, this book shows that no matter what you love your children and wouldn’t wish for anything else.

3.      Critical Analysis

Steig writes a wonderful and heartwarming story of a donkey and his parents.  With lovable characters and an interesting story line you will be reading this book for a long time.  The writing is easy to read and easy to understand.  You can feel the emotion of the characters by how they react to losing their son and how hard they search to find him.  You can also feel Sylvesters emotion and how he shuts down after being a rock for so long. “Sylvester on the hill woke up less and less often.  When he was awake, he was only hopeless and unhappy.”

Steig also illustrates this story beautifully, with many different colors, showing details in each page.  There are beautiful details in the chairs that they sit on, you can see the stars in the night sky, and the different colors of the seasons.  You also get the emotion of the mother and when she is referred to as miserable, you can see how sad she is feeling. 

Parents will follow this story more than children, because losing a child is not something children can relate to but losing something or someone that they care about could be a related message.  This story keeps you guessing and wondering if Sylvester will ever get back home, and I can see where children will want to read this over and over again. 

4.      Review Excerpt(s)

Caldecott Medal Winner.

Sylvester's "only chance of becoming himself again was for someone to find the red pebble and to wish that the rock next to it would be a donkey"—surely the prize predicament of the year and, in William Steig's pearly colors, one of the prettiest. How Mother and Father Duncan (donkey), despairing of finding their son, do eventually break the red pebble's spell and bring back Sylvester is a fable of happy families of all breeds. -Kirkus Reviews

5.      Connections

*Children can draw a picture and dictate to you what they would wish for if they found a magic pebble.

*There are many vocabulary words in this book, I would go over different words that the students may not know and make a list with definitions.