Free 5: Folk Literature: The Three Little Pigs by Steven Kellog

This three little pigs is nothing like the traditional three little pigs that I read when I was a little girl. This book actually has a mother pig named Serafina Sow and has three piglets to raise Prudence, Percy and Petey. Unlike the traditional Three Little Pigs, it actually shows a mother who wants to better her family. Perhaps when reading this book to students, the teacher could discuss the topic of families. In the story the pigs go to school and graduate to become productive members of their town. Serafina has a dream that she wants to start a family business of making waffles. When her piglets graduated from school, she retires to the Gulf of Pasta and leaves the business to her pigs. While continuing to run the wafflery, the pigs decide to separate and each move into their own homes. Of course one pig builds his house out of straw, the second pig builds his house from logs and the third builds his house from bricks. Everything is good until the hungry, big, bad wolf comes to town in search of food, but he is not looking to eat any waffles. He wants the pleasantly plump pigs and they know it. Just when the wolf plunges at them, they each flee towards their newly built homes. When he sees the wolf coming towards his house, he sends a paper airplane to the sheriff's office with the note, "HELP, SAVE ME" written on the front of it. With a burst of deep breath, the bad wolf blows the straw house over. The note reaches the sheriff but his tub falls from the sky and hits the sheriff in the head. Now the little pig has reached his brother's log cabin where the wolf noticed them both. When the wolf blows this time, he blows the pigs right in front of the other pig's brick house. As we all know, the wolf is not able to blow this house down, therefore the pigs begin to throw pumpkins, watermelons, and cantaloupes at the wolf's head. In most interpretations of the three little pigs the wolf gives up, but not in this book. He then goes and gets a trash bag and blows it up attempting to get into the house through the chimney. At this time, the pigs see the wolf and lights up the fireplace and wait for the wolf to begin to cook. The pigs don't really cook the wolf, they just covered him in maple syrup and butter until he surrenders. In the end of the book, the pigs marry their childhood sweet hearts and open waffleries around the world, which was their mother's dream all along.