The Magic Maguey

by Tony Johnston, Elisa Kleven (Illustrator)

Loving the huge maguey that grows on the land of Don Ce+a7sar, Miguel and his pueblo neighbors are distraught when Don Ce+a7sar decides to chop the maguey down, and they think up a glittering plan to save it.

Genres: Christmas, Picture Books, Holiday

32 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1996

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author by this name in the Goodreads database.

Tony Johnston has written many acclaimed books for young people. She and her husband lived in Mexico for fifteen years, where they raised their children. She now lives in San Marino, California.

Reviews

[Cheryl · Rating 4 out of 5]

Heartwarming story of a young boy and the importance of a large maguey to their village. Beautiful colorful collages. I love the interweaving of Spanish words along with the English.

[Dolly · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a wonderful tale that shows the importance of a single plant to an entire community. The story explains how the fibers of the plant are useful in different ways and how the children of the pueblo showed it's cultural and emotional importance to everyone.

The narrative is fairly short and the mixed media collage illustrations are very colorful and filled with interesting details, if a bit rudimentary. We really enjoyed reading this book together, but it bugged me that I wasn't sure how to pronounce 'maguey.'

[Madeline Huhta · Rating 2 out of 5]

In the book The Magic Maguey the people of pueblo like the huge maguey that grows on the land of Don Cesar. When the maguey is threatened Miguel tries to save it. Do you think he will succeed?

I personally didn't like this book due to the fact it has Spanish parts located in the dialogue. Overall I wasn't sure the point of this story. It didn't catch my attention.

This was hard to distinguish whether or not this was historical fiction. It had things dated from the past, and almost the invention of the Christmas tree since its placed during Christmas.