Kirkus Reviews QR Code
A TALE OF TWO TENGU by Karen Kawamoto McCoy

A TALE OF TWO TENGU

A Japanese Folktale

adapted by Karen Kawamoto McCoy & illustrated by Koen Fossey

Pub Date: Sept. 1st, 1993
ISBN: 0-8075-7748-0
Publisher: Whitman

Kenji and Joji are tengu—``goblins with long, lovely noses''—who constantly compete by extending them to huge lengths. While Kenji stays on his mountain, his nose follows a fragrance to Lord Nakamura's mansion, where a princess, thinking the nose is a pole, hangs kimonos on it—as Kenji discovers when he retracts it. When Joji tries the same stunt, the children swing from his nose—and are painfully bumped when he hastily pulls it back. Again, the rivals vie to see ``who snares the best prize,'' but by now Lord Nakamura has a score to settle. His servants tie the mysterious ``poles'' together in a knot—to which the tengu are pulled when they try to snap their noses back. Once disentangled, they agree to be friends—and ``almost never'' argue ``about whose nose is more wonderful.'' Fossey's delicate art, enhanced with brightly appealing color, is an excellent complement to McCoy's lively retelling of a tale that comes from her own childhood tradition. (Folklore/Picture book. 4-8)