Sylvester and the Magic Pebble

Sylvester finds a beautiful red pebble, and he soon learns that the pebble will grant wishes. Suddenly Sylvester is confronted with a lion. Sylvester is so frightened that he wishes he were a rock, and he is. The lion, bewildered, walks away, but Sylvester is unable to change himself back into his true form, a donkey, as he is not touching the magical pebble. He is gone for a long time until one day his parents go for a picnic and his mother sits upon his rock self and wishes Sylvester were with them, and, of course, magically he returns.

I love author/illustrator William Steig's wonderful vocabulary in his children's books.

I also love this book because Sylvester, like my husband, collects “pebbles of unusual shape and color.”

I reread this book this week because of Banned Books Week. Police associations in twelve states encouraged libraries to ban Sylvester and the Magic Pebble because police in the story are depicted as pigs.

My husband assured me that he was not offended by the depiction of a rockhound as a donkey and would not seek to have this book banned because of it.