OGRESS AND THE ORPHANS, THE

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The Ogress and the Orphansby Kelly Barnhill, an award-winning authorTags: Fantasy, magic, allegoryAudience: At least teenage and aboveStory: About brave orphans, a good ogress, a bad dragon, and a village in which the story happens.CommentsOn the positive side, the book contains some nice ideas and some nice characters. It supports kindness to people, kindness to birds and animals, neighbourliness, hard work, and other virtues. The writing style is mostly simple, as though addressed to a child, and the story ends nicely.On the negative side, the simplicity and the sugariness and the allegory tend to get on the reader's nerves; at 150 pages, the book could have been about right; at nearly 400 pages, it's more than annoying. The simplicity in places fails when the author brings in philosophical concepts; so, a child reader would probably skip these parts without understanding, always assuming that a child reader would survive 400 pages of a story that is too long by half. Many characters in the book in many places behave with a singular lack of common sense. The biggest negative is that the first three-quarters of the book is mostly about horrid people and unpleasant events; why would anybody sensible want to read this for pleasure?

Book review:CAWTranslation:Loved the kids, Ogress and the crows.Is this story about an Ogress? YesIs it about the orphans? YesDoes it have a villain? YesIs it a beautifully written book? YesssssssStone-in-the-Glen was once a beautiful town where people helped each other and the orphans were taken care of. A promising Mayor came into picture and fire destroyed the library and it didn't stop there. People just forgot how they were before and became unfriendly. An Ogress who lives by "The more I give, the more I have" comes to the village and changes the people only by her kindness. It's all about how an act of kindness brings out the good in people and also how sharing things with others multiplies the happiness of the giver and the receiver.The kids were amazy. Loved Anthea, Bartleby, Cass and Elijah for all the things they did. I wish to live in that town so that I can meet the kids, the Ogress and also to eat the delicious things she bakes.I loved how the author made the fictional people feel empathy via books which is what reading books make readers feel and some more. So The Ogress and the orphans is a story about how an Ogress, the orphans (and books) save the day. It was really nice to read a book that gave me hope after so long. Loved getting to know the narrator in the end.

I just finished reading this book, which felt better than yoga & a massage & an hour of meditation & a hot bath all together. And now I have crows cawing on my roof. (I mean, that maybe has something to do with all the peanuts I left outside by the feeders, but I'm choosing to interpret their presence as a benediction.)Anyway. I loved this book. I used to take real umbrage with the George Bernard Shaw quote "The man who writes about himself and his own time is the only man who writes about all people and about all time." I read it as being anti-fantasy, anti-SF, anti-historical fiction, as if you can only write about your lived reality. And if that's how he meant it, I do object. But I think I was mistaken.This is, indisputably, a fantasy book that takes place in a world and time that's not my current lived reality.It is also, indisputably, an extremely timely and pertinent book that speaks directly, courageously, and strongly to the current political, social, and cultural moment. (It was published on March 8, 2022.)It is a long meditation on the parable of the good Samaritan without being, in any way, Christian. It's about humanity and what we owe each other. It's about our culture and what our role is in a changing and evolving society.It is the exact thing that people are talking about when we talk about fantasy not being "fake."It's about racism and the importance of education and empty, hungry, small people using big talk and shiny gold to brainwash otherwise-decent people to behave appallingly and torpedo communities. It's about the good that's in all (most) of us. It's important to read and will be an excellent way to talk about current events with kids.

I listened on audible. I enjoyed the interpretation of each character. The story is wonderful. I bought it for my 10 year old granddaughters and loved talking about it with them.

The Ogress and the Orphans by Kelly Barnhill is a book about kindness and a small town called Stonein the Glen that lost its focus. This novel made me think about how some times we are led by peopleand we do not question there motives. I liked that this book was imaginative but relatable. After reading this book i was inspired to get to know my neighbours better. I wish it was a series and a movie. I would recommend this to any 10 year old kid.

I read a lot of really bad books, and I went into this one just happy to have found a book that seemed like it would be wholesome with a cute storyline. This was exactly that. This has a lot of elements of a traditional fairy tale - a dragon, some magic, an ogress - and the elements of a really good kids' story, including some kids who are supposed to save the day if they can just figure out how. There's a lot of love in a non-traditional family setting but they are struggling because the evil Mayor has sown so much discord that neighbors no longer trust anyone except the Mayor. A lot of the story is reasonably predictable as the Ogress turns out to be a wonderful person and the Mayor is the villain, but there are also a lot of cute twists for the reader (did you know that cats hate dragons?). The kids' ability to work through problems is important, and they have to trust that the grown-ups they love the most will help them with their problem, which are great messages for young readers.There are a lot of big words and the sentence structure is sometimes sort of difficult for a young reader to follow, but I'm about to start this as a read-aloud with a couple of younger grandkids. I recommended it as an audio book for my adult daughter. I really hope to find more from this author, which is something I don't often say!The coolest twist in my opinion was that the story is told from the perspective of an unnamed narrator. Though there are some clues, this narrator's identity is not revealed until the end. This narrator often makes the point that there is important information out there, if you just ... "Listen."

I thought this book had so many wonderful ideas and thoughts behind it, I would definitely recommend to a younger reader! However, can get a little boring as it is a bit repetitive with certain phrases. I think that’s the point of it, though. I really enjoyed it and the entire story warmed my heart. Started working with kids when I first read it so every day I’d read to some of them off of my kindle, they enjoyed it as the vocabulary wasn’t too overwhelming but also intrigued them to want to know more.