The Faithful Friend

San, S. R. D., Pinkney, J. B., San, S. R. D., Hale, C., & Simon and Schuster Books for Young Readers (Firm). (1995). The faithful friend. New York: Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers.

Genre: Traditional/Multicultural Literature

Age Level: 5-10

Summary: This story is a retelling of a traditional French West Indies story about two best friends that are more like brothers. When one of the friends, Clement, falls in love the other friend, Hippolyte, decides to make the travel with him to propose to the girl. When the girl accepts Clements proposal her uncle becomes very upset and plots to fill the couple. The uncle has zombies (witches) cast a spell on the couple. Hippolyte overhears the zombies plans and saves the couple three different times. The last time he saves the couple from a poisonous snake and the couple only sees him with a sword in his hand. The uncle accuses Hippolyte of jealousy and the couple becomes very upset because he was only protecting them. When Hippolyte decides to tell the couple about the uncle’s plan he turns to stone, as was warned by the withches if he ever revealed their plan. A stranger saves the day and tells the couple about the uncle’s plans when he uses magic to turn the uncle into stone for casting the plan. The friends all live happily ever after.

Reflection: I think this book has a great storyline. This folktale has person against person conflict between the several characters. Two such examples are between the uncle and Clement and also between Hippolyte and the zombies. The illustrator used vertical and diagonal lines in scratchboard and oil to indicate the fast pace of the story. He also used dark colors to create a sense of evil and mystery as seen in the dinner illustration and the illustration of the zombies and the serpent.

I think students would enjoy this story because the illustrations are not like the ones they normally see in most picture books and it draws their attention to the book. The plot has mystery and evil to help the students stay engaged throughout the story. Also it helps students to understand what it means to be a faithful friend.

I would recommend this story when working on making connections because it would be easy for students to make text-to -self connections throughout the story. One such place is when the author tells about the two boys being such good friends more like bothers because most students have a friend in which they feel very close to. Teachers could also use the book to discuss the effect of the dark colors throughout the story and why the illustrator used them to help connect to the text.
 

A few questions I would ask students are: What does it mean to be a faithful friend? How would you feel if you were turned to stone? Would you have rather told the truth and get turned to stone or lie to your friends in order to stay alive?