A gentle retelling for listeners ages 3–5 of Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tale: a girl no bigger than half a thumb is carried off by a toad and a beetle and nearly married to a mole underground, until the swallow she saved in winter flies her to the warm countries and the king of the flowers.
Read first 4 pagesThe opening of Thumbelina: A Gentle Retelling, free to read.
An empty flowerpot sat by a woman's door. More than anything, she wanted a child. A fairy pressed one glowing seed, a barleycorn, into her hand. "Plant this," said the fairy. "Then watch."
The woman planted it. Up poked a tulip bud, red and gold, shut tight as a fist. She kissed the petals. They sprang wide open! There sat a girl half as tall as a thumb. "My Thumbelina!"
To Thumbelina, a plate of water was a lake. She paddled round it on a tulip petal, singing her sweet, soft songs. At bedtime she curled up in half a walnut shell, under one rose petal.
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