Grandma Chickenlegs by Geraldine McCaughrean illustrated by Moira Kemp

Following the tradition of Cinderella, following the death of her mother, a stepmother arrives in the home and the father heads away on business. The awful stepmother in this story is making beautiful clothes for her own two daughters and has set Tatia to menial household tasks and of course gives her no food. She then hatches a plan to 'get rid of' young Tatia. She sends her into the woods to ask the witch named Grandma Chickenlegs for a sewing needle. Young Tatia is able to take the little rag doll gifted to her by her late mother. This magic doll will be vital to her survival. 

You might expect, as I did, that Tatia would complete a series of good deeds and that Grandma Chickenlegs would reward her with treasures or a better life but alas this is not the case. Grandma Chickenlegs is evil. She sets Tatia to work weaving at the loom all night. Then we read these really chilling words:

"Heat the water and fill the bath. You know I like my food washed before I eat it." 

Perhaps I should have talked about Hansel and Gretel.

Tatia is by nature a very kind child. When Grandma Chickenlegs gives her white bread rolls, butter and bacon she readily shares these with the cat (bacon), the dog (the rolls), and the squeaky door (the butter). Later she also gifts her ribbon to the magic elm tree in the garden.

Her kindness means she is aided in four perfect ways and so she is able to escape from the witch (Grandma Chicklegs) and even better she meets her absent father at the end of her journey. On his return home he banishes the evil stepmother and her daughters and Tatia along with the cat and dog all live happily ever after.

When you share this book (I hope you can find it in a library) with your class or library group you could use this sentence to talk about word placement:

"Around the garden, on four scratching, paltry legs ran the bleak shack. Its fence was made from whitening bones, the gateposts topped with skulls. The front door swung on its hinges squealing like a thing in pain. Its keyhole gnashed tiny, tinny teeth."

Moira Kemp's illustrations are bright and colorful -- almost comical in the scenes in Grandma Chickenlegs's house, and cheerful when Tatia is at home with her father. Pictures cover most of both pages of the open book, with text integrated into one side. Little details, like the curlers in Grandma's green hair when she's awakened, her teddy bear, and the iron teeth left on the nightstand, will appeal to observant readers. MLIS Understanding

Using twisted perspectives and vigorously applied colors, Kemp creates a set of wild, garishly lit climactic scenes dominated by the grimacing, green-skinned granny—perfect counterpart to McCaughrean’s colorful prose style... Kirkus

I am a fan of Geraldine McCaughrean but looking at her web page I can see there are SO many more of her books that I need to find and read! She has written more than 170. Click here to see some I have talked about here. I especially plan to re-read Pack of Lies. 

Boy oh boy I SO wish I had discovered this book (published in 2020) back when I was in my school library - it is one that I would have loved to share with my library readers in Grade 3 or 4 and then we would have read The Talking Eggs:

The Talking eggs

My friend recommended Grandma Chickenlegs because we were talking about this Middle Grade book I read recently and I commented that I needed to know more about Baba Yaga. It is interesting that both stories involve a magical doll. 

A Wolf for a Spell

A Wolf for a Spell by Karah Sutton illustrated by Pauliina Hannuniemi

The distrust between the wolves and the witch went back hundreds of wolf generations. No wolf ever interacted with the witch without walking away changed. At least with a human you could search for a knife or an arrow. But the witch’s magic was hidden, and could be used for any number of devious purposes.

Nadya is an orphan. She watches with great sadness when her only and best friend from the orphanage is taken away to be married to the Tsar. 

It was a fairy-tale story of the orphan girl from the woods becoming royalty that would be told by firelight for years. The tsar held to an old forest tradition that anyone who gave him a gift that he deemed worthy would be honored with a royal favor. When he visited the village, Katerina offered him one of her beautifully woven cloaks, soft as a feather and more intricate than a spider’s web. In return he named her to be his bride.

Zima is a wolf pup living alone with her two brothers because their parents have been killed. When her brother is badly injured she desperately needs to save him.

Baba Yaga is an old witch holding onto a terrible guilt. She needs to right this wrong but she is too old to travel far so she is on the lookout for a young wolf pup to use for a switching spell. 

“I must become a wolf. Yet my magic does not allow me to simply transform. I am bound by the laws of the forest, and my magic is always a trade. I need a wolf to switch bodies with me, willingly.”

The lives of these three characters will collide in unexpected ways and I am certain you will be on the edge of your seat hoping for, but not sure if, the story can reach that all important happy ending. Oh and there is also a cheeky raven who can be occasionally very helpful. 

Blurb: Since she was a pup, Zima has been taught to fear humans--especially witches--but when her family is threatened, she has no choice but to seek help from the witch Baba Yaga. Baba Yaga never does magic for free, but it just so happens that she needs a wolf's keen nose for a secret plan she's brewing . . . Before Zima knows what's happening, the witch has cast a switching spell and run off into the woods, while Zima is left behind in Baba Yaga's hut--and Baba Yaga's body! Meanwhile, a young village girl named Nadya is also seeking the witch's help, and when she meets Zima (in Baba Yaga's form), they discover that they face a common enemy. With danger closing in, Zima must unite the wolves, the witches and the villagers against an evil that threatens them all.

Opening sentence: Fear sank its jaws into Zima as she recognized the smell of magic. She pressed her nose to the ground and sniffed again. Like moonlight and decay—it burrowed into her nose, slippery and sinister. She shook her head and huffed to clear out her nostrils.

Here is a description of the tsar: Everything about him was thick and angular. He had an arrowlike nose poking out over the thick beard. When he stood, it was with one foot in front of the other, as though he were ready to begin moving again. His voice rumbled in his square chest.

There are fabulous illustrations in this book:

I picked up this book at a recent charity book sale and read about 1/3 and then because I was going away for a month and because I was SO engrossed in the story and because I cannot carry books in my luggage I also purchased the ebook version to read on the plane. This is one of those 'time is ticking' page turner stories where the 'heroes' have, in this case, only one week until the full moon. 

The cover of this book is also SO appealing and the title in intriguing - it will make more sense after you read the story. And after reading A Wolf for a Spell you will want to hunt out other books about the Baba Yaga and the house with chicken legs. 

Here are a couple of other books I enjoyed that feature wolves:

The Wolf Wilder

Wolf Siren (for readers aged 12+)

A Wolf called Wander