Books with author Lane Scieszka

You thought you knew the story of the “The Three Little Pigs”… You thought wrong. In this hysterical and clever fracture fairy tale picture book that twists point of view and perspective, young readers will finally hear the other side of the story of “The Three Little Pigs.” “In this humorous story, Alexander T. Wolf tells his own outlandish version of what really happens during his encounter with the three pigs…. Smith's simplistic and wacky illustrations add to the effectiveness of this fractured fairy tale.”—Children’s Literature “Older kids (and adults) will find very funny.”—School Library Journal

The entire book, with its unconventional page arrangement and eclectic, frenetic mix of text and pictures, is a spoof on the art of book design and the art of the fairy tale. The individual tales, such as The Really Ugly Duckling and Little Red Running Shorts, can be extracted for telling aloud, with great success. Another masterpiece from the team that created The True Story of the Three Little Pigs! -Horn Book

Did you ever wake up to one of those days where everything is a problem? You have 10 things to do, but only 30 minutes until your bus leaves. Is there enough time? You have 3 shirts and 2 pairs of pants. Can you make 1 good outfit? Then you start to wonder: Why does everything have to be such a problem? Why do 2 apples always have to be added to 5 oranges? Why do 4 kids always have to divide 12 marbles? Why can't you just keep 10 cookies without someone taking 3 away? Why? Because you're the victim of a Math Curse. That's why. But don't despair. This is one girl's story of how that curse can be broken.

A contemporary classic celebrates its 25th birthday. Twenty-five years in the Big House and A. Wolf is still sticking to his story: he was framed! As for that huffing and puffing stuff? A big lie. A. Wolf was just trying to borrow a cup of sugar to make his poor old granny a birthday cake. Who should you believe, the pigs or the wolf? You read. You decide. A quarter-century after publication, with over two million copies sold, The True Story of the Three Little Pigs remains as funny and irreverent as the inventive minds of Jon Scieszka and Lane Smith. Viking is celebrating this landmark anniversary with a handsome gift edition, featuring a stunning new jacket with lots of silver. And there's a surprise inside as well!

The twisted team that gave the world Squids Will Be Squids and The Stinky Cheese Man now delivers a whole lot of Baloney. Henry P. Baloney. Henry is an alien schoolkid who needs to come up with one very good excuse to explain why he is late for szkola, again. Otherwise, his teacher Miss Bugscuffle promises, it's Permanent Lifelong Detention.Henry's tall tale of his lost zimulis-received from deep space by Jon Scieszka-is told in at least twenty different Earth languages and graphically recreated in Lane Smith's out-of-this-world illustrations.The unbelievable trip into Henry's wild universe may be the most original excuse ever for being late for szkola. Or it might just be Baloney. Henry P. Baloney.

Sure we'd all love to be able to go around telling stories about all the weird, scary, and just-plain-annoying people that we know. But the truth is, no one likes a gossip. Here, the irrepressible Jon Scieszka and Lane Smith have found a way around that problem-they just make like Aesop and change all the people to animals or food, add a moral to each story, and call the stories fables! With tales like "Little Walrus," in which too much of the truth is a dangerous thing, the cautionary "Slug's Big Moment," wherein Slug is so caught up in herself that she doesn't see the steamroller behind her, and "Straw and Matches," which illustrates quite clearly why you should never play with matches (because they cheat), the eighteen fables in this uproarious collection are sure to delight readers both young and old.

"Amoeba"Don't ever tease a wee amoeba By calling him a her amoeba. And don't call her a him amoeba. Or never he a she amoeba. 'Cause whether his or hers amoeba, They too feel like you and meba.What if a boring lesson about the food chain becomes a sing-aloud celebration about predators and prey? A twinkle-twinkle little star transforms into a twinkle-less, sunshine-eating-and rhyming Black Hole? What if amoebas, combustion, metamorphosis, viruses, the creation of the universe are all irresistible, laugh-out-loud poetry? Well, you're thinking in science verse, that's what. And if you can't stop the rhymes . . . the atomic joke is on you. Only the amazing talents of Jon Scieszka and Lane Smith, the team who created Math Curse, could make science so much fun.

Jon Scieszka introduces some really stupid off-the-wall fairy tales including: "Chicken Licken", "The Princess and the Bowling Ball"; "The Really Ugly Duckling", and "Jack's Bean Problem". Chosen by children as the Book of the Year for the Federation of Children's Book Groups, this book was described by "She magazine" as, 'The most delightful collection of stories a young cynic could hope to read'.