Swamp Angel

By Anne Isaacs, Paul O. Zelinsky (Illustrator)

A fearless woman faces a ravenous bear in a legendary showdown.

3.9/5 Goodreads · 2,110 ratings

48 pages· 1,267 words· Est. 10 min read-aloud

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Bookroo's summary

In the heart of Tennessee, a fearless woods-woman named Swamp Angel takes on the challenge of a lifetime: hunting the insatiable bear, Thundering Tarnation. As the other hunters mock her, she vows to turn the tables with a bear pie. With her extraordinary strength and wit, Angel's epic battle stirs mountains and shapes prairies, leaving a mark as vast as the heavens. Will her legendary skills be enough to conquer the beast and prove her mettle? Dive into this tall tale of humor, bravery, and monumental adventure.

From the publisher

Working in an American primitive style animated by the humor and storytelling genius for which he is renowned, Caldecott Winner artist Paul O. Zelinsky puts oils to cherry and maple for this tall-tale competition between a Tennessee woods-woman extraordinaire and a hungry, fearsome bear.Thundering Tarnation has a bottomless appetite for settler’s grub. When word goes out about a competition to hunt this four-legged forest of stubble, a young woman, second to none in buckskin bravery, signs up. “How about baking a pie, Angel?” the other hunters taunt. “I aim to,” says Swamp Angel. “A bear pie.”What follows is as witty a round of roughhousing as ever jostled the ranks of Americana. Anne Isaacs’ original text unfolds in a crackling combination of irony, exaggeration, and bold image-making. Zelinsky’s paintings respond with deft yet hilarious expressions, rhythmic shapes, and a sense of monumental motion, as benefits a heroine who can wield a tornado like a lasso, drink a lake dry, and snore down a forest. In the course of these grand shenanigans, the Great Smoky Mountains are stirred up, Montana’s short-grass prairie laid down, and Thundering Tarnation’s fate proves to have no less a reach than the starry heavens.Swamp Angel marks the debut of a promising new storyteller and adds to the tall-tale traditions a pictorial counterpart that will entertain and endure for a long time to come.