Batman Classic: 5-Minute Batman Stories

by John Sazaklis

Batman battles the dark forces of Gotham City night after night. With Commissioner Gordon and Robin by his side, Batman stops the slickest of tricksters and the grimiest evildoers. This collection features twelve of Batman's most thrilling adventures, each with full-color illustrations on every page and timed to be an action-packed, 5-minute read-aloud. With a sturdy, padded cover and over 190 pages of fun, this storybook collection makes anytime the perfect time to serve up some justice! This collection includes lightly adapted versions of 12 favorite Batman stories.

Genres: Childrens, Dc Comics, Picture Books, Fiction

192 pages, Hardcover

First published June 30, 2015

About the author

John Sazaklis is a New York Times bestselling author with over 80 children's books under his belt! He has also illustrated Spider-Man books, created toys for MAD magazine, and written for the BEN 10 animated series. He is currently senior designer at Random House Childrens Books.

Reviews

[Khurram · Rating 5 out of 5]

I actually bought this for my 6 year old, to encourage him to read, and become a Batman fan. Success on both of these fronts is the reason for the 5 star rating. He read one story then went straight to the next one. I actually had to stop him so it took 2 day for him to finish it.

As I am already a Batman fan an not the age group it was aimed at it would be unfair to put an judgemental adult slant on the rating. Hee hee me an adult. The stories are good a bit watered down making them more child friendly but not necessarily childish which is great. The illustration are big and bold. The are also many guest stars from other Superheroes to members of the Bat-family. There is just enough text make you feel kids have done some reading for the night. However if your kids are like mine the problem will be getting the to put the book down before they finish all 12 stories.

[Clay Davis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great artwork. Learned about Knight and Squire and Chief Man-of-Bat.

[Cara · Rating 5 out of 5]

A gift to my son so we could read more about Batman, one of his favorite superheros and not have to return the book to the library.
We all enjoyed reading the book, seeing our favorite villains from when we were going up and sharing them with my son.
My only criticism is that Mr. Freeze wasn't included, even though his gun was during one of the stories.

[Reha · Rating 4 out of 5]

Got it for my 5 year old nephew, kept it for myself. Not sorry.

[Anthony Wei · Rating 5 out of 5]

I like this book because it’s cool.

[Brian · Rating 3 out of 5]

My child loves the Avengers, Star Wars, and Batman. We read one of these stories every night. They are good short stories, but definitely get tedious after awhile.

[Jesse Bangles · Rating 5 out of 5]

Classic bad guys, very enjoyable

[Kristen · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a fun book. It had 12 Batman stories in this compilation. I liked the pictures in it. Each story took a little longer than 5 minutes, but that could have been because I would stop to show the pictures to my husband while he sat and read with us at night. My daughter loves Batman for some reason. On every page she would point to him and yell "NaNa!" for Batman. Even when she laid down for a nap, she would point to the book and want to read the book before her nap. Haha

The stories were all kind of cheesy. There were a LOT of bad puns. But I think that's just how that series was, even in the comics. Kids would like it - they would think the puns were pretty funny. I think the last story was my favorite (Battle in the Batcave). It kind of pulled all the stories together as Bane fought with all the other villains weapons.

Batman had a lot of help throughout these stories - people like Superman, Robin, Batwing, and Batgirl show up to help Batman a lot. I felt like Batman did very little of the actual crime fighting! He was always being saved by someone else! The last few stories were good though.

If your child enjoys superheros, you should check this book out. It was a fun read. I think my daughter is going to be disappointed that we don't have any Batman stories left to read tonight...

[Karen · Rating 2 out of 5]

The illustrations are great. My 5 year old loves this book.

There are a lot of plotholes. (I don't know if that's the author's fault, or if these stories were simplified from originals, or if the original stories also had plotholes.) And the prose is labored, especially when the author decides that he needs to use synonyms for Batman and Superman.

[Heather Jo · Rating 4 out of 5]

megan winter reading 2016, children's book, picture book, short stories, batman, superheroes, kindergarten, first grade