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Summary
Summary
Ugly just isn't like the other ducklings in the clutch. His neck is too long. He's stays underwater for "too many" seconds. He keeps climbing onto Mother's back whenever he's afraid. So when all the other ducks of Dove Lake turn against him, Ugly's mother has no choice but to protect her family and leave her darling genius behind. Armed only with his natural curiosity and a few good pieces of advice, the ugly duckling must find his way alone. Luckily, the friendship of a few wonderful characters--a boxing wallaby; two bold geese; a maternal wombat; a spunky possum--makes his journey a lot easier. But what is it that Ugly is searching for? By setting this story in Tasmania, Donna Jo Napoli turns expectations on their heads and gives readers a fresh and funny look at this classic tale of finding one's identity.
Author Notes
Donna Jo Napoli was born on February 28, 1948. She received a B.A. in mathematics, an M.A. in Italian literature, and a Ph.D. in general and romance linguistics from Harvard University. She has taught on the university level since 1970, is widely published in scholarly journals, and has received numerous grants and fellowships in the area of linguistics.
In the area of linguistics, she has authored five books, co-authored six books, edited one book, and co-edited five books. She is also a published poet and co-editor of four volumes of poetry. Her first middle grade novel, Soccer Shock, was published in 1991. Her other novels include the Zel, Beast, The Wager, Lights on the Nile, Skin, Storm, Hidden, and Dark Shimmer. She is also the author of several picture books including Flamingo Dream, The Wishing Club: A Story About Fractions, Corkscrew Counts: A Story About Multiplication, The Crossing, A Single Pearl, and Hands and Hearts. She has received several awards including the New Jersey Reading Association's M. Jerry Weiss Book Award for The Prince of the Pond and the Golden Kite Award for Stones in Water.
(Bowker Author Biography)
Reviews (5)
Publisher's Weekly Review
In the tradition of her The Prince of the Pond and The Magic Circle, Napoli here retells Hans Christian Andersen's The Ugly Duckling, but with an educational bent that at times overwhelms the story. Set in Tasmania, the book opens when the as-yet-unhatched narrator hears a freckled duck speaking ominously to his mother, a Pacific black duck, about the odd shade of his eggshell. After he hatches, the freckled duck exclaims, "That thing's as ugly as ugly gets," and the name sticks. Ugly loves his mother and siblings, but discovers that he behaves and thinks differently. His oddities put the whole duck family at risk, as other duck species attack Ugly and the rest of the brood, and Mother leaves him behind at less than one week old. The narrator's na?vet? allows readers to learn right along with him about the animal life indigenous to Tasmania: he climbs onto a wallaby's back for protection, stays in a wombat's burrow for a time, and survives the winter with a Golden Brushtail Possum, before discovering his true identity as an Australian black swan (which readers likely will have gleaned from Judge's half-tone illustrations). Napoli's descriptions of Ugly's first flights are among the novel's highlights. But the sheer number of animals (and two stints with human families) often push Ugly's character development to the background, making an ending that should feel triumphant fall somewhat flat. Ages 7-10. (Jan.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Horn Book Review
In this rich retelling of the Andersen tale, Ugly is driven from the duckling family he's born into and forced to fend for himself in the Tasmanian countryside. He tries to befriend various creatures (e.g., wallaby, human, wombat) but faces a difficult search to discover his true self. The often melancholy first-person narrative is accompanied by realistic black-and-white illustrations. (c) Copyright 2010. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted. All rights reserved.
Booklist Review
Gr. 3-5. Napoli takes Andersen's familiar fairy tale The Ugly Duckling and embroiders upon it to create a novel-length story. Told from the point of view of Ugly, the little bird who makes a most unpromising duck, the narrative begins as he listens through the shell as another duck berates his mother for trying to hatch a dark, silent egg that is so clearly a dud. Though the story follows the outline of the familiar tale, Napoli moves the setting to Tasmania and sends Ugly on a protracted land-based adventure in which he befriends indigenous animals, including a wombat, a wallaby, and a Golden Brushtail possum, while learning the meanings of terms such as nocturnal predator. Studded with information on Tasmanian fauna, this section seems overextended and a bit purposeful. Still, the book may interest children who enjoy novels based on fairy tales and remember the ugly duckling fondly. Judge's illustrations were not available for review in the galley. --Carolyn Phelan Copyright 2006 Booklist
School Library Journal Review
Gr 2-4-Using a Tasmanian setting for this retelling of Hans Christian Andersen's "The Ugly Duckling," Napoli has fashioned a witty and entertaining book. The "duckling," called Ugly by his Pacific black duck siblings, is late to hatch and behaves strangely, but is sustained by his mother, who believes he is smart. Ejected from the duck colony after a severe pecking because he is different, Ugly sets off to find a friend. Many helpful animals, including a wombat and a golden bristletail possum, provide advice, warmth, and knowledge. They also alert him to dangerous predators such as a quoll, spurred platypus, and Tasmanian devil. Ugly also learns about humans when he encounters a family and an old woman who talks to herself and her pets. Humor lightens the story. Ugly meets teenage ganders that verbally and physically spar like egotistic adolescents, but the story takes a grim turn when the shocked duckling (surprising, too, for readers who may not be familiar with the original tale) witnesses their brutal slaughter by hunters. After a long and lonely year, Ugly discovers his true identity-he is a beautiful Australian black swan-and finds a home. Like Avi's "Poppy" series (HarperCollins), this book is lush with details of the natural world and animal behavior and an elegant use of language. An excellent read-aloud.-Susan Hepler, formerly at Burgundy Farm Country Day School, Alexandria, VA (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Kirkus Review
Trust Napoli to work her usual alchemy and make a fabulous coming-of-age story from the bare outline of the reassuring ugly-duckling trope. Told in the first person from the time he's inside the egg, hatched by a Pacific black duck in Tasmania, the hero--and he is definitely a hero--rouses to the sound of his mother's voice. But she has to let him go, as the other ducks attack him and endanger Ugly's duckling siblings. He quickly learns that his instincts aren't quite duck-like, or goose-like, so he is constantly trying to fit into habits and habitats that aren't quite right. He makes friends with a wallaby, two geese, a wombat and a possum. Some of them come to violent ends, but Ugly learns from them what he is and isn't and how to cope. When Ugly finally discovers that he is a swan, and not at all ugly, readers will have learned a great deal about various Tasmanian wildlife. They will have giggled mightily at the silliness of baby ducks and how the actions of cats and people might look to a young male swan. Tucked into this wondrously spun tale so deftly that one might scarcely notice are beautiful lessons about finding oneself, about fitting in (or not), about the implacability of nature and weather and the importance of maternal advice. (Fiction. 7-10) Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.