Sine Van Mol

Christa, Klaas and Thomas were convinced that their elderly neighbor, Meena, was a witch - one who ate toads and drank blood. Their vivid imaginations led them to say all sorts of terrible things about her, and to interpret everything they saw as evidence of her wrongdoing. From the little girl who came to visit her - surely a prisoner! - to the cherry pie she offered - made of blood? - everything about her seemed sinister. Even when the little girl insisted that Meena was no witch, but her own grandmother, the children of Fly Street didn't quite believe it. It took all of Meena's calm friendliness to overcome Thomas' fear, and then he led the others into a friendship with this unexpected neighbor...

Originally published in Belgium as Mina lieverd, (literally: "Mina Sweetheart"), Meena is a book that I initially sought out due to my interest in witchy picture-books - a perennial pet project of mine. It wasn't clear to me, from the book description, whether the eponymous figure was actually a witch (perhaps just a nicer one than the children believed), or simply an old woman mistaken for a witch by frightened and silly young children. Either way, I thought it would be interesting, especially as translated children's literature is another pet project of mine. As it happens, it is an example of the latter story type, and addresses themes of intergenerational mistrust and (eventually) friendship. Another picture-book example of this story type would be Carol Carrick's Old Mother Witch, while a classic children's novel to explore the theme would be Elizabeth George Speare's The Witch of Blackbird Pond. Given my general interest in the the depiction of witches in children's literature, I have created two separate tags to track these different but related story-types: "witchy-witches" for tales of actual witches, and "the crone" for those featuring old women who are mistaken for witches. Although Meena belongs more fully to the latter category, I have also retained the "witchy-witches" tag, given some of the early illustrations in the book, which depict the children's imaginary visions of Meena in witchy garb.

Leaving all of that aside, as interesting as I found this book, from a story-type perspective, and as much as I appreciated the eventual message of friendship between the young and old that it promulgated, I had some mixed feelings about the way in which the story itself was told. I suppose that it is realistic that children can sometimes be very mean-spirited, but I found Christa, Klaas and Thomas terribly unsympathetic, and therefore had difficulty entering fully into the pleasure that the happy ending was no doubt meant to evoke. While their fear of Meena might have been natural, the trio's persistent nastiness to her felt very unpleasant. I have vivid memories of the elderly woman who lived in my own neighborhood, growing up, and how we local children believed she was a witch, living in her massive house on the hill, with its dark brown wooden shingles. Truth be told, we were all a little frightened of her, and yes, we sometimes told stories about her, amongst ourselves. That said, our parents would have had something to say, had we gathered outside her house, writing things on the sidewalk about her, and chanting nasty refrains outside her window. This seems to cross more into the terrain of bullying and elder abuse, than simple fear of the elderly, which is (alas) sometimes present in the very young. Despite my distaste at the behavior of the children - and after all, young people can behave in these ways, so Sine van Mol's narrative is in no way unbelievable - I did find this story engaging overall. The artwork from Carianne Wijffels, which looks to have been done in a variety of media, including collage, is quite interesting. I liked the vivid use of color, and how this was contrasted with the elements created in a more restrained blue outline. All in all, an interesting and engaging picture-book, one that I would recommend to readers seeking children's stories about relations between the young and the elderly.… (meer)

The main idea of this book was three children believed that a woman living on their street was a witch. They meet the granddaughter of the woman and thought she was under a spell. When they tried to send a note to the grandmother to go away, they were caught and talked to the grandmother. They ended up becoming friends and ate pie together. I liked this book for two reasons. The first, the illustrations were a mix of child drawings and adult art work. On the first page, it was covered in illustrations of what the children think the woman looked like. The second reason I enjoyed this book was because it showed a moral in the story. At first, the children did not trust the woman and thought she was a witch. At the end of the story they became friends with her and ran to play at her house. It shows how prejudgements are wrong and a person if given the chance can become a friend.… (meer)

I had mixed feelings about this book after reading it. One reason I liked the book was because of the characters and the way that they develop, especially Christa. She was the one who was the most skeptical about Meena and the last person to warm up to her. Klaas and Thomas ate the pie that she made the day before and it was interesting to watch them overcome their fears of a grandmother. One reason I did not like this book was because of the writing. The story was written in a way that would be harder for children to understand, and there was nothing special about the story to me. Also, I did not like the illustrations. They portrayed Meena in different ways so it was confusing to what she actually looked liked. The pictures were dark and mysterious and didn't seem to help tell the story in anyway. The main theme of this story is about children finding friends in places they wouldn't expect and overcoming their fears.… (meer)

Overall, I enjoyed the message that readers can gain from this book. The children in this story learn the age-old message not to judge a book by its cover. Due to some misconceptions, they believe that the old woman living down the street from them is a witch. This message is something that all children can learn from. Children often make snap decisions about people based off of how they look or act without getting to know them first. Once the children in the story got to know Meena they realized they had unfairly judged her. However, there were a few aspects of the story that I did not like. For example, I found the main characters in this story hard to like and relate to. The children who believe Meena is a witch attempt to do violent and crude things to her. For example they attempted to poison her with a letter. In addition, when Meena’s granddaughter tries to explain to the children that Meena is not a witch they disregard her and say she must be under a spell to think that. In addition, I did not like the illustrations in this book. Although the images capture the readers’ attention with their large size and vivid colors, I personally found them to be a bit creepy. The artistic style of the illustrations did not appeal to me and I often found that they distracted me from the text.… (meer)