Just So Stories

Rudyard Kipling's Just So Stories is one of the best-loved story collections ever written for children. Now Ian Wallace, one of Canada's most accomplished children's book illustrators, reinterprets the famous tales with his vibrant art, bringing Kipling to a whole new generation of young readers. Kipling wrote the stories for his young daughter, who would only sleep if they were told "just so." The first edition was published in Great Britain in 1902, along with black-and-white illustrations by the author himself. The stories have remained in print ever since, delighting young readers all over the world. Many of the tales are origin stories, explaining how an animal came to be the way it is. They are ripe with imagination, inventive vocabulary and word play. This new edition, published more than 110 years after the original, has been edited to remove any racist language. The first handsome volume includes "How the Whale Got His Throat," "How the Camel Got His Hump," "How the Rhinoceros Got His Skin," "How the Leopard Got His Spots," "The Elephant's Child" and "The Sing-Song of Old Man Kangaroo." The second volume will be published in spring 2014. Inspired by these remarkable stories from all around the world, Ian Wallace has chosen to make an annual donation to IBBY's Fund for Children in Crisis.

Rudyard Kipling's Just So Stories is one of the best-loved story collections ever written for children. In this companion to Volume I, published in fall 2013, acclaimed children's book illustrator Ian Wallace once again reinterprets the famous tales with luminous art, bringing Kipling to a new generation of young readers. Many of the tales are origin stories, explaining, for example, how an animal came to be, or the how the alphabet and writing began. They all display Kipling's vivid imagination, inventive vocabulary and engaging word play. And once again Ian Wallace makes intriguing connections between the stories in his richly imagined illustrations. The second volume, as visually breathtaking as the first, includes "The Beginning of the Armadilloes," "How the First Letter Was Written," "How the Alphabet Was Made," The Crab That Played with the Sea," "The Cat That Walked by Himself" and "The Butterfly That Stamped." The first edition of Just So Stories was published in Great Britain in 1902, along with black-and-white illustrations by Kipling himself. The stories have remained in print ever since, delighting young readers in many countries. This new edition, published more than 110 years after the original, has been edited to remove a few references now understood to be offensive. Inspired by these remarkable stories and the fact that they are set all over the world, Ian Wallace has chosen to make an annual donation to the International Board on Books for Young People's Fund for Children in Crisis (www.ibby.org).

Originally the elephant had a short nose the size of a boot, flexible but useless for grasping things. One little elephant was insatiably inquisitive. He asked so many questions that all his relations spanked him.