Friday, June 28, 2013

Little Miss Austen Pride & Prejudice: A Counting Primer by Jennifer Adams, Illustrated by Alison Oliver

 I’ve seen reviews of this cute children’s counting book of Pride and Prejudice over the past two years and decided it was high time I checked it out for myself as part of the Pride and Prejudice Bicentenary Challenge.  I got a copy from our local library through inter-library loan and read it a couple nights ago to my two-year old daughter, Penelope.

Penelope and I both enjoyed the beautiful illustrations in the book.  Penelope likes to count and we had a fun time reading through the book and counting.  Her favorite page was the “6 Horses.”  She liked the colors and counted the page a couple of times.
The first half of the book is very Pride and Prejudice specific with such pages as “2 Rich Gentlemen” and “4 Marriage Proposals.”  The second half is more general, but regency related with the “6 Horses” and “9 Fancy Ball Gowns.”  The Pride and Prejudice references gave me a laugh, but did tend to befuddle Penelope a bit when it came to counting.  She liked the simple horse page, but was confused on the “1 English Village” page as it depicted a village with several houses.  To Penelope, there should have been one item.  She also got confused on the “10,000 pounds a year” page.  While I thought it was funny, she had a hard time counting as she wanted to count the red pound notes as well as the white.  Only the white equaled ten.
My seven-year old son Kile also listened to this book out of curiosity as well.  His favorite page was “4 marriage proposals.”  (Sorry for the flopped picture, I am having technical difficulties) He was flummoxed that someone would say no to a marriage proposal and really wanted to know why.  I tried to explain how Mr. Collins was unsuitable and Mr. Darcy was also not right at first, but he was befuddled.  Hopefully this does not lead to him not wanting to propose at a later stage in life!  If only there was a Pride and Prejudice for seven-year olds  . . .
Overall, Penelope said “This book is good,” which is a high praise from a girl who loves books.  I also enjoyed the book as well and will be checking out some other books in this “BabyLit” series. 
Book Source:  The Kewaunee Public Library

2 comments:

  1. I actually bought this for my 22 year old Austen-loving daughter last Christmas. We both loved it!

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  2. I was actually thinking that I wouldn't mind buying this for myself to keep - I'm glad I'm not the only adult that enjoyed it!

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