Introduction:

Like all good storytellers, Nancy Schimmel starts with a story. She than discusses the story behind the story. Finally, the author makes the point that we are all storytellers. Some of us are naturally better than others. She points out that this book will help storytellers acquire the skills of a good storyteller.

Organization:

Schimmel starts off with several chapters on the basics of storytelling. Then she moves on to the stories. Next she discusses where to use stories and why to use stories. Finally she introduces several themes with annotated lists of stories.

Nancy Schimmel's Just Enough to Make a Story is full of good, practical advice. It is also a super resource. It contains a number of complete stories and themed lists of stories.

She breaks the process of storytelling up into four parts. First, choose the story that you really like and want to tell. Read it aloud, record it, or tell it to someone to see how sounds. (p. 4)

Second, learn the story. Some of what Schimmel writes is obvious, but she probably has a few pointers that a teller hasn't considered. There is a good suggestion here about learning the plot before attempting to learn the words. (p.7)

Telling the story is the third part. Practical advice is included such as what to do when you forget something important in the story. Schimmel suggests such phrases as, "'Now everyone knew that.' or 'He recollected that..' or even now, I should have told you that.' but not 'Uh oh! I forgot to tell you about the.' Experienced tellers don't stop making mistakes-they just learn how to repair them with out fuss."(p.9)

Forth, Schimmel discusses the medium. Besides straight storytelling, the author also mentions singing, chanting, dancing, pictures, puppets, paper folding, and play-acting.  She suggests looking for the best medium for the story and gives ideas to add variety to a storytelling program. (p.15)

The stories themselves:

The stories included are very tell-able as written. There are also illustrations and detailed instructions for several paper folding stories. One story, The Pancake, is for two tellers. This book includes sources and stories for all ages.

Source Notes:

The source notes are fabulous. They include where the story came from or how she came by the idea for an original story. Schimmel notes if there are various versions and in what book the stories can be found.

Summary:

I recommend this book. There is good advice from a seasoned teller. The resources are also very useful. My only criticism of this book is that I do not like the book design and layout. Each page is the standard 8 ½ by 11 inches. The text is in two columns and there is a bit of white space, but the font is too small. I would prefer that this book was a large trade book size.

©2004 Librarians.info. All rights reserved. Karen Woodworth-Roman Last updated 29 March 2004.