It's Not About the Tiny Girl! Read online

  Jake replied.

  “I can lend you the nutshell,”

  offered Lily.

  “I’ll show just Thumbelina.”

  “Thanks, Lily,” said Jake.

  “That’s really nice of you!”

  “But I need it back after school,”

  Lily told Jake.

  “Thumbelina needs her bed tonight.”

  The bell rang then,

  calling the friends back to school.

  ABOUT THE STORIES

  Thumbelina, written by Hans Christian Andersen, is a well-known story about a tiny girl and her adventures. But there are many other stories about tiny characters, mainly boys, that can be found in cultures from around the world.

  Peanut Boy is based on a story that comes from the Andes mountains in Chile, South America.

  Little Inch is a retelling of a popular story from Japan called Issun-boshi. (A wish-fulfilling hammer is a favorite type of magical instrument in Japanese tales.)

  Baby-man is inspired by part of a Native American tale, Boy-Man, that appeared in a collection titled Indian Fairy Tales as Told to the Children of the Wiguam by Mary Hazelton Wade, published in 1906.