Jeremiah in the Dark Woods by Allan Ahlberg illustrated by Janet Ahlberg

"Once upon a time there were three bears, seven dwarfs, five gorillas, a frog prince, some sleeping beauties, a wolf, a dinosaur, a Mad Hatter, a steamboat, four firemen on a fire-engine, a crocodile with a clock in it, a considerable number of giant beanstalks - and a little boy named Jeremiah Odadiah Jackenory Jones." Listen here

When I share this book with a class as I read this I ask the students to count on their fingers the number of stories or fairy tales they can identify and then we go back and list the stories, laugh about the gorillas and enjoy the fun of repeating Jeremiah's whole name.

Now back to the story... Grandma has made some jam tarts. Delicious jam tarts. The crocodile asks "would these be jam tarts? ... (and) by any chance would this jam be strawberry jam all dark and delicious from the baking ... And is it possible that the pastry of these tarts is a golden brown with glorious little crisp and curly edges?"

Grandma leaves the tarts on the window sill to cool because she plans to ask Jeremiah to them to his auntie who lives beyond the Dark Woods, across the river, over the hills and a great way off. But before she can pack the tarts into a basket for Jeremiah to carry they make the dreadful discovery that the tarts have been stolen. 

Jeremiah is a brave boy so he puts on his boots and sets off to find the 'no good thief who has stolen his aunties tarts.'  Along the way he meets all of those characters we read about in the first sentence. Each character has a very distinct voice. I adore reading the section with the crocodile for example.

Once upon a time when we read this book I would buy those little jam tart biscuits and share them with the children at the end of the story which usually took us two or three library sessions to complete. Astute readers will identify the thief long before we reach the end but for the majority of Grade One and Two children this always comes as a surprise and luckily (spoiler alert) Grandma does make another batch of tarts when Jeremiah finally arrives back home.

I mentioned this book earlier this week and I saw that I blogged about it ten years ago so I re-read this delicious book today.

Geraldine McCaughread said:  "I think (this book) ... is literally 'perfect' - not a word wrong, not a comma out of place."

Jeremiah in the Dark Woods is one of my ALL TIME most favourite books to read aloud to Grade 1 or Grade 2 students in my school library. This book was first published in 1977 but I thrilled to see it is still in print. The new paperback is a slightly smaller size.

A few discussion questions:

The five gorillas have an alibi. What does this mean?

This wolf had on a pair of overalls and was doing repairs to a motor-cycle which was upside down on the ground, surrounded by tools and bit of machinery. do you believe him when he says he is not guilty? Why or why not?

What do we know about the character of the crocodile from this sentence: The crocodile was cleaning its teeth with a toothbrush and smiling at itself from time to time in a small silver mirror.