Full AspenCat Catalog

The little red hen finds none of her lazy friends willing to help her plant, harvest, or grind wheat into flour, but all are eager to eat the cake she makes from it.

A retelling of a folktale in which a beautiful girl with long golden hair is kept imprisoned in a lonely tower by a sorceress. Includes a note that traces the Italian, French, and German origins of the story, and discusses the author's decision to mimic the style of Italian Renaissance art in his illustrations.

In this Algonquin Indian version of the Cinderella story, the Rough-Face Girl and her two beautiful but heartless sisters compete for the affections of the Invisible Being. This variation on the Cinderella tale takes place in an Algonquin village on the shores of Lake Ontario.

When the eldest son fell in the well and most of the time getting help was spent pronouncing the name of the one in trouble, the Chinese, according to legend, decided to give all their children short names.

Anansi the Spider uses a strange moss-covered rock in the forest to trick all the other animals, until Little Bush Deer decides he needs to learn a lesson.

Anansi the trickster spider joins Turtle on a fishing trip, intending to trick Turtle out of all his fish. However, Turtle proves to be smarter and ends up with a free meal. Explains the origin of spider webs.

A clever spider tricks Elephant and some other animals into thinking the melon in which he is hiding can talk. A tricky spider outwits all the other animals in this African folk tale.

A beautiful daughter dreams of meeting a handsome prince, but in order to save her father's life, she leaves home to live with a terrible, frightening beast.

A freshly baked gingerbread cowboy escapes from the rancher's wife's kitchen and eludes his pursuers in this western United States version of the "Gingerbread Boy."

A retelling of a Danish folktale in which a greedy cat grows enormous as he eats everything in sight, including his friends and neighbors who call him fat.