Waterstones Classic Starts (R): The Wind in the Willows

Author: S M

Rating: 5

Review: For anyone who has a dislexic child, retold story are a godsend. Sadly there are not that many available. My son was supposed to read the original version - he is in year 6 and this one is about 150 pages long and a bit simplier but still not that easy as the vocabulary is still tricky and rich. We are going through chapter by chapter. I hope this will hep some other parents.

Author: Roy Norris

Rating: 3

Review: The suitability of this adaptation really depends on the age of the child you are buying it for (if indeed you are buying it for a child). For my six-year-old I'm sure it will be fine; it will introduce her to the story, but, as can only be expected, little if any of the descriptive magic of the original version. I actually bought it for my nine-year-old, who I started reading the unabridged version to but who found some passages of Kenneth Grahame's writing pretty hard going. This 'Classic Start' helped us out of a fix - we got two thirds of the way through the original and she was finding the rather long, descriptive chapter 'Wayfarers all' difficult to comprehend and asked to stop. So I resorted to this adaptation to finish the story. With the benefit of hindsight (it was the first time I had read this book as well) I would not have done this. It leaves out some excellent scenes from the original which really should be there, including much of the chapter 'The Further Adventures of Toad', in which Toad, dressed as a washerwoman, steals a horse, sells it to a gypsy, hitches a lift in the same motor car that he had previously stolen then ends up crashing it. These scenes are all beautifully narrated by Grahame in language which is accessible for young readers, all very funny, and all important to understanding just how boastful and selfish Toad is - and yet all left out of this Classic Start version. So whilst this series is undoubtedly very useful in introducing children to the sometimes inaccessible classics, I would not recommend this particular edition if a) you are going to read the book to your child and b) your child is a strong reader/good listener who tolerates a certain degree of language which they do not understand. For this type of child, read the beautifully told original version, but leave out the heavy going chapters 'The Piper at the Gates of Dawn' and 'Wayfarer's all'. You'll be doing this child a disservice if you buy the Classic Start version. However, if your child is younger and you just want to familiarise them with the story, then this one, at 144 pages, is probably as good as any.