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Ribbon Rescue – Book Review

Mommynificent Posted on by

I haven’t exactly figured out how I want to do book reviews for this site, but I know I want to, so I thought I’d just jump in today with one of our very favorites.

This post contains Amazon affiliate links.

This is Robert Munsch’s Ribbon Rescue. You probably know Robert Munsch already because of the book Love You Forever, for which he is most famous. To be honest, Love You Forever is actually my least favorite Munsch book; I just find it too bizarre. But lots of people love it, so what do I know?

Munsch is a prolific Canadian author who loves to make children laugh with the silliness of his books. I’ve also heard that he is great about answering children’s letters, but we haven’t tried writing to him yet. Some of our other Munsch favorites include Kiss Me, I’m Perfect!, Andrew’s Loose Tooth, The Sandcastle Contest, and Smelly Socks. The Paper Bag Princess is also delightful and may actually get its own post here someday soon.

But our very, very favorite is Ribbon Rescue! It has some of Munsch’s classic silliness, lots of great repetition, and beautiful illustrations by Eugenie Fernandes. And the teacher in me just goes ga-ga over this book because you can go so many different directions with it and it fits in with so many different themes! The story is about a Mohawk girl from the Kahnawake reserve near Montreal, Quebec, and the traditional Mohawk costume ribbon dress her grandmother makes for her to wear to a wedding.

But while she is waiting outside for her mother, the groom, the bride, some wedding guests, and the best man come running by one-by-one, all with a problem and late for the wedding. To solve each one’s problem, the young girl uses ribbons from her dress, and then she provides each with a different form of transportation, ranging from skates to a wagon, to get to the wedding more quickly. But when she gets to the wedding (also late!), the usher at the door won’t let her in because she’s all dirty and her dress is torn from helping everyone! She sits down to wait on the steps outside, but all ends well as the bride and groom find her there and make her their flower girl, torn dress and all.

Some of the themes I see this book fitting with well include kindness, sacrificial giving, inner beauty, problem solving, transportation, time/punctuality/planning ahead and even Native American/First Nations studies. Plus, it’s just fun to read over and over again! I hope your family finds as much joy from this book as ours has! We even made ribbon dress costumes for a book fair celebration a few years ago! Happy reading!

P.S. If you are a children’s book lover like me, you will LOVE my sister’s website, Three Books a Night! She actually knows what she’s talking about!

Comments

Ribbon Rescue – Book Review — 18 Comments

  1. Yay! What a fun review! I actually just bought this book a few weeks ago from a used bookstore! I know how much your girls love it and was so excited to find it. Munsch has so many fun books! And I agree, Love You Forever is odd. Although I read once that he wrote it to not be sentimental and when he reads it to kids it has a completely different feel and is downright silly. Kids apparently think the book is hilarious especially when the old woman carries the grown son. Made me look at it a little differently. 🙂

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    • I’ve actually heard that too. I heard Munsch was totally puzzled when he did a test read with some kids of Love You Forever. The kids were cracking up as expected, and then he looked at the row of parents and they were all crying. He couldn’t figure out what was going on!

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  2. I love Munsch. I really want to share his stuff with my kids, however I find some of the words or actions in there a little hard to explain to kids who I want to be good, you know? Like in the end of Paper Bag princess she calls the prince something which I can’t remember. My kids picked up on that and called each other that. Or another one is the snowsuit book. The kid doesn’t obey the principal or the teacher.
    Any thoughts on how to address those issues in Munsch books or other books?

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    • Hi Corrie! Sorry I never responded to your questions here. I must have missed them. I do skip over some of Robert Munsch’s books for exactly the reasons you’ve mentioned here. However, if my kids pick them out, I try not to be too much of a book censorer, so we just talk openly about what the characters are doing that is wrong or inappropriate. And if it goes unpunished in the book or, worse, they seem to be rewarded for it, I find that gives us a good opportunity to talk about how that often happens in real life, but that God promises that sin always gets punished eventually.

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  4. Well, we are so glad you have started to write reviews lol, very enjoyable. I have never heard of this author, but we are pretty new to the picture book world. It sounds delightful. Thanks for joining us on the Kid Lit Blog Hop and we hope you will return with some more great reviews, cheers Julie Grasso

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  5. Ok, first of all…LOVE Robert Munsch and we’ve read all his books and have been to his plays as well (three times!) We have also read Ribbon Rescue and we enjoyed that one too. Mud Puddle is one of my favorites. Actually I have many,many favorites – too many to list. I’m so glad you joined us in the Kid Lit Blog Hop. I hope you’ll continue to review books and link up again! I’ve subscribed to your site via email. 🙂

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  6. I have read Love You Forever but not heard of this book. It looks like a delightful book and such a sweet story! Thanks for sharing and thanks for linking up to “Making Your Home Sing Monday!”

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