Beastly Tales

This book brings together legends and fairy tales, poems and songs, ancient traditions and modern adventure stories that animals from different forests around the world tell and sing to their young ones—mostly before bedtime.

The collection also includes fairy tales from the village of Okhotki: they will let wild readers become acquainted with the beliefs and myths, everyday life and customs of little-studied rural animals.

“Beastly Tales” by Anna Starobynets is a spin-off—a branch—from the popular cycle “Beast Detective,” intended for all its fans and their younger sisters and brothers. Here, the Senior Badger of the Police of the Far Forest tells the little Badgerotiok about the Heavenly Bears.

The dog Polkan entertains the puppy Muhtarich with stories about the Great Dog and his sworn enemy Pusy-Done.

A Persian cat remembers how the black magician cat Noir lured her into the Forest of Shadows. The little brothers-detectives Ug and Chak learn that where the Near Forest used to be, there once was a field of honey-carrots grown by a flying rabbit Krylukh. The badgeress Melesandra convinces her daughter that her father was the first badger on the Moon.

A brave groundhog Shaking Tail listens to the story about the laughing witch Koye, the ancestor of coyotes; the giraffe Rafik—about the legend of the Gods of Mango who created the first animals of the desert; the penguin chick—about hunting tales told by the penguin-shark hunter; and the little puppy-dog—about a chilling blood-freezing fox-fable of the Frozen Demon.

Performers: Sergey Azeev, Sergey Mardar, Anna Kochetkova, Vitaly Gudkov, Alexander Lushin, Anton Leonov, Mariya Kukushkina

Songs: Alexander Lushin