The Wizard of Wallaby Wallow

by Jack Kent

A mouse helps a wizard discover what's lacking in his magic spells.

Genres: Picture Books, Childrens

48 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1971

About the author

John Wellington "Jack" Kent (1920 – 1985) was an American cartoonist and prolific author-illustrator of children's books. He is perhaps best known as the creator of the comic strip King Aroo. In addition to his own books, he illustrated more than twenty books by other authors.

Reviews

[Ask Miss Patience · Rating 5 out of 5]

Part of a lot of four classic books bought on eBay with my all time favorite Andrew Henry’s Meadow. Jack Kent’s The WIZARD or Wallaby Wallow is a delightful surprise.

Unhappy and organizing his spells, the wizard finds an unmarked bottle. While attempting to figure out what to do with the unlabeled potion a mouse stops by asking to be someone else. Could the wizard help.

The unmarked bottle is given for free.

Later the mouse returns different. Happy. Unchanged on the outside. The little creature’s inside transformed. Which overjoyed the wizard whom goes through his own transformation. Which spreads to everyone in the town.

Highly recommend this book for children and even grown people 😁

For activities children could imagine themselves as different characters, and decide what problem might occur with this change. Then, pick one unique reason why they like themselves. Similar to the mouses journey.

Children can make a list of pro’s and con’s of being themselves. Encourages to make improvements on the thing they don’t like. Such as, homework is hard. Studying and asking for help make things easier.

To assist young children it can be helpful to give them options to choose from and pictures. For creativity various animals to choose from not listed in the book could be helpful.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💯

[Lauren · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of my all time favorite books from childhood.

[Maggie · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this book ages ago. It has stuck with me and I think of it often, as I did today. It is a great book to read to your children and will probably become a family favorite. I highly recommend it.

[Prabhat sharma · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Wizard of Wallaby Wallow by Jack Kent- Children’s Illustrated Colour Picture Book- The book narrates of a wizard and a mouse. One day, the wizard is placing his bottles of potion in the cabinet according to alphabetical order. On each bottle the name of the potion was written. While the wizard was re-arranging the bottles, there was a knock at the door. The wizard said that he is busy and the guest should come some other time. The person who was knocking at the door was a mouse. He heard the wizard still he entered his house. Mouse is sad because he does not want to remain a mouse. His grief is reflected from his face. He informed the wizard that he was tired to remaining a mouse. He requests the wizard to provide him with a potion which will change him into a person of his choice. Wizard provides the mouse with a bottle which does not have a label. The mouse comes to his house with the new bottle. Mouse thinks that tortoise, cat, elephant, butterfly, honey bee, ant, bird but he knows their difficult life. He is satisfied in remaining a mouse. He happiness is reflected from his face. He comes to the house of the wizard to return his bottle of magic potion. Wizard is not able to recognize the happy mouse. Mouse introduces himself. The Wizard says that the mouse has taken the potion two times. Wizard is satisfied and happy. He leaves all his bottles in his cabinet. Message- We must be happy with what we are. Coloured illustrations help the reader in relating to the story. I have read the Hindi language translation of this book.

[Capn · Rating 5 out of 5]

Jack Kent is the wizard. I only discovered his books today, courtesy OpenLibrary (what a wonderful resource that is!!!). They're ALL good, and this one, in its simplicity and cuteness, might be my favourite of the lot... then again, There's No Such Thing as a Dragon and Clotilda's Magic are fabulous, too.

Don't miss these ones. Deceptively simple, as all brilliant picture books are. But they are so solid, psychologically speaking, and entertaining.... I'm a huge Jack Kent fan, now. :) Will be reading whatever InternetArchive and OpenLibrary have from him, AND secretly hoping that someone republishes an anthology, a la A Treasury of 8 Books (Phaidon!! Can you do it?!), which I will buy. That's right, publishers - I'll buy a lux hardcover edition. Make it!

[Tabby · Rating 4 out of 5]

I thought this was a cute book. The art is sketch like and feels straight from a child's imagination. The story is of course silly but fun and has the timeless moral that there is no one you should ever want to be but yourself. I think The Wizard of Wallaby Wallow will become a favorite in our house.

[Matthew · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a cute little story about a wizard who sells a potion for change to a mouse tired of being a mouse. Very clever story about being happy just being you. This theme might be repeated and redone, but self-care and love seem to be something that many people still don't do enough of. My rating - 4/5

[Lynn Davidson · Rating 4 out of 5]

A funny story about a mouse who didn't want to be a mouse anymore so he went to a wizard who had bottles of magic potions. The wizard gave him one that had no label, so he didn't know what he'd be changed into. He realized that being a mouse wasn't so bad after all. Funny ending.

[Sierra · Rating 3 out of 5]

A story about being happy with what you have by seeing that other people’s lives aren’t always necessarily better than ones own.

[Clare Wilson · Rating 5 out of 5]

A heart-warming & simple story with a very meaningful message!

[Zoë · Rating 5 out of 5]

Love, love love this book... one of my childhood favorites! What a great story and lesson for anyone to remember!

[Rae · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fun story, good message!

[Mindi Zappe · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of my favorite children’s books! I learn to be grateful for the life I have and to have a more positive perspective in life.

[Callie McCormick · Rating 5 out of 5]

I still have a copy of this book from my childhood and recently dusted it off to read to my children. It is still just as wonderful as I remember it! I believe it is out of print now, but if you find a copy at your local library, I would highly recommend it for children of any age.The Wizard of Wallaby Wallow

[Judy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I know, technically this isn't an alphabet book, but I added it to the alphabet shelf because the wizard is trying to alphabetize is stock of magic spells. This appeals to kids who are learning to spell and maybe even to alphabetize. I thought this was a fun story with an interesting twist to it, but I didn't expect the kids to like it as well as they do.

[Sue Berg]

The Wizard (Unabridged)

Author: Jack Kent
Date:
01-JAN-2008
Narrator:
Ian Thomson
Provider:
Weston Woods Studios
Running Time:
7 min 29 s

[Bridget]

Have the audio version