Illustrations are beautiful as always. The story was a rendition of the gingerbread man. ( )

Great book for the holiday season, as well as teaching a lesson about history and what used to be normal for an era past. This book takes us on a chase through what I can only assume is Northern Europe looking for a gingerbread man that has escaped. This book is a great way to show off some of the time differences we have like the way houses were built and having to use a well for water. ( )

Brett takes the simple refrain of the uncatchable gingerbread man and expands it into a wonderful story that utilizes her tried and true format of story expansion through slowly adding characters which wraps up with a clever twist at the finale. In this case, she has an increasing number of family members, animals, and villagers begin to chase the wily gingerbread baby as he runs away from his baker, Matti. Matti may have disobeyed the recipe and peeked at the gingerbread man before he was done baking (therefore resulting in the magical gingerbread baby), but he returns to the recipe book to learn the secret of how to catch the gingerbread baby. I won’t reveal the secret, but it’s definitely worth the wait to read the final pages! ( )

Gingerbread Baby Remember how the Gingerbread Boy is eaten by the fox? Well, not this Gingerbread Baby in a delicious twist to a favorite old tale. It all begins when Matti opens the oven too soon and out jumps a cheeky little Gingerbread Bay. He leads Matti's mother and father, the dog and the cat. And a whole colorful cast of characters on a rollicking chase through the village and into the forest, staying just out of reach, daring them to catch him along the way. But Matti's not with them. (amazon)

Matti opens the over to find the Gingerbread baby jump out and run out the door. The Gingerbread baby runs and runs to get away from the animals and Matti’s mother and father, and takes them on a chase through the village and into the forest. Matti stays at home with illustrations in the borders making a gingerbread house for the Gingerbread baby to run into after the chase. Jan Brett's illustrations are magical, and this is a fun book to read around Christmastime.