Once Upon a Unicorn
by Isla Wynter
illustrated by Anju Chaudhary
Date: 2021
Publisher: Peryton Press
Reading level: C
Book type: picture book
Pages: 32
Format: e-book
Source: Kobo
Blaze the unicorn is born without a horn - will he be able to get it back?
Or is he maybe not a unicorn at all?
Join Blaze on his adventures as he searches for his horn, meets new friends and encounters an unexpected foe.
This illustrated children's book tells a magical story of friendship, helping others and forgiveness.
Revised edition with beautiful new illustrations.
(synopsis from Goodreads)
The pictures here are cute, but this book suffers from a major problem: The creatures depicted aren't actually unicorns. They're winged horses.
The story is fairly predictable. A "unicorn" named Blaze is born without a horn. But it turns out that an evil camel has stolen all the horns. So Blaze steals one back, the camel apologizes, and... I guess there's some sort of lesson here.
Huge chunks of the text were missing. At least, I'm assuming that's the case. There were some blank pages, and it seemed like parts were missing from the narrative because they were referred to later. I guess it's a formatting issue, but it needs to be corrected. I think a good portion of the showdown with the camel was missing, which is unfortunate.
Overall, I'm not impressed. The plot is silly, the "unicorns" aren't actually unicorns, and the formatting issues mean the reader doesn't get the full story. The illustrations are somewhat appealing, but even they can't save this one for me.
Premise: 2/5
Meter: n/a
Writing: 3/5
Illustrations: 3/5
Originality: 2/5
Enjoyment: 2/5
Overall: 2.33 out of 5
No comments:
Post a Comment