Like his distant cousin Rumplestiltskin, Tom Tit Tot is a small, magical creature who offers to help a young woman with her impossible sewing requirements. In the kind of comedy of errors that can only occur in English folk tales, the heroine eats too many pies, marries a king who has eyes only for her spinning wheel, and makes a deal to save her life. The only question is, can she guess her benefactor's name and prevent trading one form of servitude for another?

The Caldecott medalist Evaline Ness's charming illustrations are appropriately fantastic and strange; each page appears to have been carved in wood, complementing the historical feel of the narrative's language. In a time when many classic folk tales and fairy tales are being distilled into unrecognizable forms, Tom Tit Tot, a Caldecott Honor Book, keeps this classic story as refreshingly pure and unrefined as it was 100 ago or more.