![]() Minnow's sense of purposelessness, her feeling that she is somehow not as worthy as her sisters, echo the insecurities that many children experience, and those young people will find a person with whom to identify, in this little mermaid. Family dynamics, in the form of sibling rivalry, play a role, but the main thrust of the story seems to be the age-old questions of what we are doing here, and what we are meant to do with our lives. Campbell's The Mermaid and the Shoes is a beautifully-told and beautifully-illustrated story, one with plenty of enchantment, but also lots of heart. In the process she learnt, not just what the red thing was, but what she was born to do: ask questions, explore, and share what she had learned with others.Clearly inspired by such fairy-tales as The Little Mermaid, by Hans Christian Andersen, K.G. Where did the bubbles go, she wondered, and why didn't crabs have fins? When the warm surface current brought Minnow an odd red object that she could not identify, she set out to the edge of the underwater kingdom to investigate. What she was, was a mermaid with lots of questions. ![]() ![]() She wasn't a talented singer like her sister Calypso, or a gifted gardener like Clio. ![]() Unlike the forty-nine other daughters of King Neptune, little Minnow had no extraordinary gifts, or special skills. ![]()
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