The Knight Who Wouldn't Fight: 1

Product Information

This review is based on a copy provided by the publisher in exchange for a fair and honest review. All thoughts and opinions are my own. Next, Leo arrives in a town where a dragon has been wreaking havoc and the townsfolk are too afraid to leave their homes. The dragon spies Leo and squares up for a fight. Leo tames him and gets him to tidy up the town by – you guessed it – promising to read him a story. And, of course, the best part – in my opinion – is that the Knight doesn’t fight but instead encourages the beasts he encounters to read. And I think that is absolutely wonderful. Because in this age where technology is running fast, it’s good to remind children that a good book is also good entertainment. Plus, it’s funny because the children are reading about reading!

However, he doesn't fight like a knight normally would. He never even lifts his sword (except to point out that he has one). Instead, he takes out a book about whatever creature it is that he encounters on his journey and reads it to them! This settles down the creatures and allows him to continue on.The story is told in rhyme, which I always love as I feel it engages the children more in the story. My four year old was captivated. The illustrations are bright and beautiful. Picturebook enthusiasts know just how much louder than words pictures speak for the little people that read them; they express those feelings that can be so difficult to put into words. With The Knight Who Wouldn’t Fight, Helen and Thomas Docherty have created a narrative which is exciting and entertaining with a big important theme at heart. Any child reading about Leo in this adventure, will understand that words and stories can solve issues better than swords can, and in this tale lies their introduction to diplomacy at an early age. The story is told in verse; the rhymes and lovely bouncy rhythm make it a delight to read aloud. There’s a warmth and gentle humour to the text too. Oh, and the dragon poo line made me laugh out loud!

Helen and Thomas Docherty form a formidable pair while delivering a message through a rhyming story and wonderfully colourful illustrations of magical creatures familiar to us from other tales. The rhyming text, which makes for a lovely read aloud, is where readers will find the overt messages about why reading and sharing stories is so important, but the artwork is where the covert, latent messages will be found. Two types of such messages are particularly striking in The Knight Who Wouldn’t Fight: images of closeness when reading and the use of light at nighttime. Both of these are vital to children in the preschool years, both convey safety and comfort to them. Closeness with a loved one when reading, also known as joint attention reading, not only brings comfort, it also helps children learn. This is emphasised greatly within the visual narrative by the fact that those Leo is joint reading with are supposedly scary beasts, highlighting further the transformative powers of book sharing. The Storybook Knight is about a little mouse knight. However, is he isn't what you normally think of when you think of a knight. He is not much of a fighter, he is more of a reader (much to his parents dismay). So one day, his parents find an ad looking for a knight to tame a dragon and they send their son off!

I really like how this book doesn't condone that you need to fight to be brave and to solve your problems. That you can use a book (and your smarts) and find a solution. Also, I like that it shows that books bring people (or creatures!) together! That being said, The Knight That Wouldn’t Fight, is one of those books that I think children will really enjoy. One that they are probably going to ask their parents to read again and again because it’s a wonderful story. Full of rhyming words and a courageous mouse, it’s a story that I hope will capture the soul of many children throughout it’s lifetime. I absolutely LOVE this book for children. First of all, the message. The message! The moral of the story here is this: you do not need to fight to get what you want accomplished, you can use your brain. And that, my friends, is what this world needs a little (or a lot) more of. If we can teach our children this, our future would be bright. Using witty rhyming text and a similar soft and comforting colour palette to the one used in The Snatchabook, The Knight Who Wouldn’t Fight carries a strong message not only about the importance of reading, but also the power of reading and stories and how it makes us better people, people who choose reaching out over fighting, using references to mythical and traditional “baddies” to illustrate this in a way that children will understand. This might seem a romanticized, ideologized view of reading to some and I am sure many of the blood-thirsty dictators this world has suffered over the centuries loved books and reading, but the point of such a story is to show the wonderful possibilities that reading and sharing stories can bring us. Writing a picturebook aimed at preschoolers that shows that reading and loving stories makes you better at school, or gets you a better a job might work very well, but the best way to convey such messages is to confront them within a safe and entertaining terrain with themes they will understand and want to relate to (such as a being brave), and The Knight Who Wouldn’t Fight manages to do just that, conveying big ideas in a setting that is exciting and appealing for the targeted audience.