I liked how this version ties in other fairy tale tropes. ( )

Picture-book author Eric A. Kimmel teams up with illustrator Megan Lloyd in this retelling of the traditional Russian tale of Baba Yaga and the Little Girl. The daughter of a widowed merchant, Marina was kindhearted and beautiful, save for the horn growing on her forehead. When her stepmother, taking advantage of the merchant's absence, sent her to the witch Baba Yaga for a needle and some thread, Marina was saved by her own kindness, managing to have her horn removed and to escape the witch's soup pot. Her stepsister Marusia was not so kind, and far less fortunate...

Baba Yaga: A Russian Folktale is the thirty-fourth picture-book that I have read from the prolific Kimmel, and I found the narrative itself quite engaging. This is the same story, in slightly different form, as that told in Joanna Cole and Dirk Zimmer's Bony Legs. Unfortunately, although I did appreciate the story, and found the accompanying illustrations from Megan Lloyd appealing enough, in their own right, I thought that text and image were significantly mismatched, and it detracted from my enjoyment. I have encountered Lloyd's work elsewhere - in Linda Williams' The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything and Too Many Pumpkins, and in Kimmel's The Gingerbread Man - and have always found it pleasant, in a cute, cartoon-like way. But her style simply isn't suitable for a story about that fearsome witch, Baba Yaga. The threatening tone and creepy atmosphere of the story don't match at all with the cute, but fairly bland artwork, nor is there any sense, visually speaking, that this is a Russian story. The scene in which Baba Yaga pursues Marina shows the witch flying on a broomstick, holding a small pestle, when traditionally she rides in a massive mortar, steered by a similarly massive pestle.

Although I am always happy to read different retellings of traditional tales, in the end this one wasn't a success. I'd recommend that readers looking for Baba Yaga stories try something like Marianna Mayer and Kinuko Craft's Baba Yaga and Vasilisa the Brave, or any folktale illustrated by the marvelous Ivan Bilibin. ( )

With a wicked stepmother and ugly stepsister I expected the tale of Baba Yaga to be a Russian Cinderella story, but I was pleasantly surprised to find out how different it really was. When Marina's hateful stepmother orders Marina to go borrow needle and thread from Baba Yaga, Marina doesn't dare disobey even though she is very afraid of the witch. Along the way a frog gives her helpful advice that she later uses to escape the mean old Baba Yaga and returns home to find her father alive and well and waiting to greet her after his long journey to foreign lands. This was a great version of Baba Yaga. The language used was dramatic and suspenseful at just the right times and comical in others. The illustrations complimented and really added something special to the text instead of detracting from it. ( )

I enjoyed reading Baba Yaga, a folktale I had never heard of. The story is a bit confusing sometimes. The message is that kindness is rewarded. ( )

Baba Yaga is an evil witch who everyone in the town is afraid of. She gives off a fear among children and adults. Marina proves that being kind will be repaid in a good way, in comparison to Baba Yaga, her greedy sister and stepmother. Because Marina was friendly to the animals around Baba Yaga's home, she was able to escape the witch. Marina's sister was rude to the frog and therefore did not receive the advice that saved Marina. The evil and greedy characters did not see a happy end that Marina saw in the story. Eric Kimmel used an influence of the Cinderella story in his Russian folktale of Baba Yaga. Illustrations were comical and fun, therefore appealing to younger children. ( )