Public Domain Pooh!

This is the second volume in a series that retells every chapter of A. A. Milne's Winnie-the-Pooh with worse prose, grammar, punctuation, and spelling. There is some humor to be derived from how bad it is, but why anyone but a Pooh completist like me would bother with this is beyond me. But in case you're curious, here's my rundown:

Piglet Catches a Heffalump

Reimagines Winnie-the-Pooh Chapter Five: In Which Piglet Meets a Heffalump.

A fairly faithful retelling of the original story has Pooh and Piglet baiting a pit with honey in hopes of catching a Heffalump but ending up looking like a pair of fools when they can't keep to their own plan.

It's Zinnie's Birthday, and There's a Lot of Honey

Reimagines Winnie-the-Pooh Chapter Six: In Which Eeyore Has a Birthday.

New character Zinnie -- a female Pooh Bear -- steals the lead role in the birthday story originally starring Eeyore. ("Figures," Eeyore was heard to moan.) Everyone in the Hundred-Acre Wood -- including Eeyore -- runs around to find honey to give her as presents. And that's it.

Kanga and Roo, Visit the Forest and Piglet Beats

Reimagines Winnie-the-Pooh Chapter Seven: In Which Kanga and Baby Roo Come to the Forest, and Piglet Has a Bath.

The xenophobia is eliminated as everyone is so eager to have Kanga and Roo in the forest that they recruit Piglet's father, Pig, a master carpenter, to help build them a wonderful tree home.

I have no idea what that fractured title is supposed to mean, but that's how it appears on the story and in the table of contents. Is the word "off" accidentally left off the end, perhaps?

The closing paragraphs present a great example of the lack of editing:

Pooh and friends felt very proud of their decision and what they have done. Suddenly, someone knocked on Kangas door. They all looked up and thought, "Who could that be?" A big head peaked inside the open door. "Hey guys it's Panda." "The birds told me you were all here." "Kanga, Nice place!" Kanga looked at Panda warmly and said "Thank you so much."

So they all celebrated together and had dinner together with Kanga's first visitor. After some time they all said their good byes as Roo squelled "Bye guys,I love you" They all went home as the stars began to rise in the sky and Kanga prepared Roo for bed in their new Home.

Christopher Robin was wide eyed and welled up with tears. Christopher's Robbin said, "Wow, Kanga lucked out." He grabbed his Pooh bear as if he knew it was the end of the story. "Agreed" I said. "Kanga and Roo." [sic, all the sic, oh so very sic]

Winnie the Pooh Discovers the North Pole

Reimagines Winnie-the-Pooh Chapter Eight: In Which Christopher Robin Leads an Expotition to the North Pole.

Zinnie, Panda, and a slightly renamed "Alexander the Beetle" tag along on this noodling version of the expedition to the North Pole. It adheres to the main plot points, but takes away all the humor and delight.

There is a slight reference to Tigger that teases his current exclusion from the public domain, and that's the closest this book gets to being even remotely clever.

FOR REFERENCE:

Contents: Introduction -- Piglet Catches a Heffalump -- It's Zinnie's Birthday, and There's a Lot of Honey -- Kanga and Roo, Visit the Forest and Piglet Beats -- Winnie the Pooh Discovers the North Pole

(My Pooh Project: I love Winnie the Pooh, and so does my wife. Having a daughter gave us a chance to indoctrinate her into the cult by buying and reading her every Pooh book we came across. How many is that? I’m going to count them this year by reading and reviewing one every day and seeing which month I finally run out. Track my progress here:
https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/23954351-rod-brown?ref=nav_mybooks&she... ) ( )