Brett, Jan. The Mitten. Canada: G.P Putman’s Sons, 1989. 25



Nicki’s grandma thought he’d lose his snow-white mitten. Was she right? The Mitten, by: Jan Brett is a superb children’s story that I have always enjoyed and do truly love.

I do believe this book falls under the Fiction category. The Mitten is a charming tail about a young boy named Nicki. You see, Nicki desperately wanted a pair of snow-white mittens, but his grandma was doubtful, for she feared, “ if you drop a white mitten in the snow, it will be hard to find” (Brett, 3). But Nicki wanted those mittens so badly that Baba (his grandmother) made him his snow-white mittens. Surely enough, as Nicki went out to play in the snow, he unknowingly dropped one of his mittens, and because he was unaware, proceeded off to continue his day in the woods.
After this event, a little mole found the mitten and curled up inside. Next a rabbit skipped on over and scooched in next to the mole. Next came a hedgehog, an owl, a badger, a fox once it started to snow, and then came a bear who squeezed himself in the mitten.
Somehow all these animals, some as big as you, just magically fit into a mitten the size of your hand. And what do you know? A tiny mouse hopped up on the bear’s nose where its whiskers tickled the bear’s nose and what happened? That’s right. The bear sneezed. The bear seriously sneezed so darn hard that all the animals flung out of the mitten in an exploding fashion.
I really did, however, enjoy this book. I especially loved the pictures in it and the entire story overall is adorable. I like how it was in 3rd person, “when she finished knitting, Nicki put on the mittens and went out to play,” (Brett, 5) because had it been from Nicki’s point of view, if he ever got his mitten back would not know why the mitten was so stretched out. Had it been from his grandma’s point of view, there wouldn’t even be story because she only knows half of it. And had one of the animal’s been telling the story, well that would’ve been messed up because animals can’t write stories about events in their lives.

I also enjoyed the characters. Baba seemed like a really sweet old lady (mainly because she’s a grandma that sews and that just makes her seem like a quality person) and Nicki has this totally awesome grey/blond hair (I know this because the pictures prove it). And all the animals played a superb role because they made the story really cute with how they all fit into the mitten.
Overall though, I loved this book and I would most likely recommend it to children ages 2-7. But age doesn’t have to stop you from reading this extremely awesome story!