When you open the book you will get wet. When you go inside you will slip! Everything is washed in water, even the furniture and the stairs and the pages and the words, everything floats. So for anyone who likes to swim… One two three – jump!
*****
One day, a resolutely ordinary young man named Mr. Whatwilltheysay returns home to find Grain-of-Sand, a mermaid, waiting for him in his favorite armchair. Despite his objections, the two embark on a series of very watery adventures as he tries to get rid of her. But ultimately the thought of being seen with half a fish is simply too much for Mr. Whatwilltheysay to bear – what would people say? So broken-hearted Grain-of-Sand returns to the sea in his bathtub, leaving Mr. Whatwilltheysay to resume his pedestrian existence. Mr. Whatwilltheysay soon finds that his beloved landlubber life, however, lacks the splash and shimmer (and bathtub) of his good times with Grain-of-Sand – and acting against all his instincts, he sets off to sea to find her.
The Mermaid in the Bathtub is a charming, gorgeously, funny tale by the beloved author and illustrator duo Nurit Zarchi and Rutu Modan.
2001 | 36 pp. | Age 5-10 | English translation available | Rights sold: English (2019), Hebrew
“What you will find inside is actually much more exciting than a standard fairytale… The real lure here is the amazing art by Modan. All kinds of kooky details fill the pages, and that flying fish with wings and legs may be my favorite unnamed character of all time. It’s wackadoodle and I love it. Hand it to the mermaid obsessed kiddos. It’ll blow their little minds.” ~ World Kid Lit blog
“Full of wry humour and surreal artwork. Modan’s comic-style illustrations are striking, colourful and fun. While younger readers will appreciate the amusing story and visuals, this multi-layered tale will also appeal to older readers (and adults) with its questioning of what is considered normal, embracing difference and accepting of others.” ~ Outside in world
“An excellent translation and tale about accepting others and embracing change.”
~ Margaret Kennelly, School Library Journal, USA
Nurit Zarchi is The Top beloved poet and author for adults and children. She has published many poems and over 100 children’s books, poetry, prose and research. Zarchi has received every major awards including the prestigious Andersen Medal for Children’s Literature (four times), the Bialik Prize, the Ze’ev Prize (four times), and she was twice the winner of the Prime Minister’s Prize for her literary work.
Rutu Modan is a prominent illustrator and comic book artist and a professor at the Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design, and former editor of the Hebrew edition of MAD Magazine. Her graphic novels Exit Wound (2007) and The Property (2013) were translated into 15 languages. Both books won the Eisner Award. In 2008 she published an illustrated blog for the New York Times. Modan has received the Israel Museum Ben-Yitzhak Award for the Illustrations of Children’s Books multiple times.