| Mr. Peabody's Apples | 
 enlarge | Authors: Madonna, Loren Long
Creator: Loren Long
Publisher: Callaway
Category: Book
List Price: $19.95
Buy Used: $0.41
You Save: $19.54 (98%)
New (71) Used (75) Collectible (17) from $0.41
Avg. Customer Rating:  100 reviews
Sales Rank: 45661
Media: Hardcover
Reading Level: Ages 9-12
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 40
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1
Dimensions (in): 10 x 8.1 x 0.3
ISBN: 0670058831
UPC: 051488019954
EAN: 9780670058839
ASIN: 0670058831
Publication Date: November 10, 2003
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Condition: Standard used condition.
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| Customer Reviews:
 I enjoyed this book and appreciated the underlying moral October 29, 2007
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I enjoyed Mr. Peabody's Apples. While I believe that Madonna is quite liberal and I am quite conservative, I applaud Madonna for her efforts to provide children's books that capture a kid's fancy, yet provide a moral under the surface. My daughter is in 6th grade now, and last year much of the typical cattiness involved with preteen girls reared its ugly head with the excitement of spreading rumors. My daughter would come home with tales of this girl and tales of that girl (thankfully they were pretty tame tales) and we would talk about whether the stories were true, why somebody would act that way, and how would she feel if people were talking about her like that. During her 5th grade year I ran across Mr. Peabody's Apples and immediately correlated Mr. Peabody letting the feathers out of the pillow to the gossip spread at her school. I bought it for her to read and we discussed afterwards how you can't get back things you've said. Around this time my daughter's school had "Muffins for Mom", a day when moms come and read books to their kids' class. I choose to read Mr. Peabody's Apple to her class. I went to a craft store and bought a couple of bags of colorful feathers. BEFORE I read the book to the class, we all went outside and each student took a handful of feathers and on the count of 3, we threw them into the air (it was quite a beautiful site). We left the feathers on the playground and went inside and read the story. When the story was over, we talked about rumors and how it is impossible to get them back (just like the feathers). We then went outside and tried to get ALL of the feathers back, which was impossible. I think they had fun and got the point. Occasionally I run across the little baggy of feathers in my daughter's room, and it reminds me of that day and the moral of the story. I hope it remind her too.
From a teacher's point of view... April 3, 2007
1 out of 2 found this review helpful
I used this book in my 4th grade Reading/Language Arts class as a "Somebody-Wanted-But-So" writing lesson with bilingual/ESL students. It lent itself very well to that lesson (my principal had my partner & I give a staff development lesson using this). The students enjoyed the book because they all could relate to jumping to conclusions and repeating gossip. I have Madonna's other books, and this is by far my favorite.
I've read the other reviewers' comments about the book as well. I think some have taken too deep a look into the book's purpose. Forget who authored it...I'm not a Madonna fan myself (not my genre of music). Enjoy it for what it is: a simple story with a simple lesson that's important.
peabody's apple March 20, 2007
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
If you like 300 year old stories, this book is for you. Mr. Peabody's Apples was inspired by a 300 year old story. The author is Madonna. I don't know if it is the real
Madonna or not. I don't think it is. Mr. Peabody's Apple is good for 2nd grade to 5th.
This book has good illustrations. The art is by Loren long. This story takes place in Happville. I don't think it is real. It started off with a baseball game. Mr. Peabody also went to congratulate his little league team. My favorite part is when the wind carried thousands of feathers to Happville. Each represents one person in Happville.
The characters are of course Mr. Peabody and Billy little. Everybody thinks Mr. Peabody is a thief. Mr. Peabody is a teacher, but then he steals an apple. Another character is Tommy.
I think that the story teaches you not to steal. This book has proper English. It dose not have words like, "yo" or "dude." I think that is good for kids. If I was able to give it a rating I would give it a five star ratting.
I think this book is great. It is better then the The Cat In Hat. I really like Mr. Peabody's Apple. I think you should read this book. This book would be good for you. I hope you like my book review.
 Parents, beware the website invitation to "visit" Madonna March 20, 2007
3 out of 13 found this review helpful
I borrowed this book from the library. I consider these books, written by a person who is the antithesis of a children's book author, to be nothing more than an indoctrination into Madonna's lifestyle, and her religion. Parents should keep this in mind-that's all I'm trying to say.
I remember the old Ford ad campaign, "Quality is job 1." I also recall a parody of it, in which the faux pitchman, speaking of his cheap imports, said, "With us, quality is job 2. Job 1 is getting the damn things into the country!" It seems the first job of these books is to get Madonna's website address into a child's hands. If not, why is it there? Is Madonna's website a children's website? Well? Would you send a child to that website and just leave them alone with it? No? Then why is Madonna asking kids to visit her official, grown-up website? What "professional" idiot in this book's development path let that in?
This book could have been based on any fruit or vegetable, but it's about apples. It is also dedicated to "teachers everywhere." As such, I'd imagine this thing has found its way into many schools, which is a shame. I'll get to the story in a minute. First, let me point out what else this book is bringing.
Inside the dust jacket, we're told this is an interpretation of a story told to Madonna by her Kabbalah teacher. Okay; fair enough. But if your kids get curious, they'll do an internet search on the word and the first thing which will show up is the trademarked Kabbalah website, where you can pay over 26 bucks for some trademarked "Kabbalah Red String." I don't want to turn this from a review to a discussion about the Kabbalah website, but there is plenty to buy there, it is expensive, the folks there are very serious about your need for these items, and some regard Kabbalah as a cult. Parents should know that.
Madonna's profits are cited in the credits page as being earmarked for the "Spirituality for Kids Foundation." Fine. But parents should also know that this is a branch of the Kabbalah, as set up by the people who run the trademarked website. And, I keep saying "website" as it is there where you will find everything for sale. Whereas, if you want a Bible, you can get one for free from the Salvation Army or the Gideons or the internet or very inexpensively at a used book store...but I digress. Anyway, the "charity" is the Kabbalah itself. Parents should know.
Also in the credits page is an invitation to "Visit Madonna," at her website. As we all know, Madonna's videos and lyrics are not meant for kids. If that''s something you've forgotten, please try to recall the video she made for Like a Prayer when she portrayed herself as having Jesus' wounds on her hands, and the Erotica video with the pain/pleasure lyrics of "Only the one that hurts you can make you feel better/Only the one that inflicts pain can take it away."
Verrrry nice for her adult fans. Not for kids. At all. End of story. Period!
Parents should know. It's all in the book, so it's part of the review. There.
Now, for the rest of it. The illustrations by Loren Long are very well done. It's a shame (and an indication of the size of Madonna's ego) that Madonna refuses to give the artist credit on either the front or back covers. I just can't imagine how people can accept "lessons" from somebody who won't share credit for a project (Madonna should be READING a children's book about "sharing"). And, while the illustrations are very good, it's a little odd that everyone depicted is rail-thin, much like all the girls were depicted in Madonna's earlier book, the English Roses.
Ostensibly, the moral of this story is that spreading rumors is bad. Okay...but the way the story is told is full of holes, and the hidden message seems to be that children should be punished for honest mistakes, while adults should not.
The Peabody guy is seen taking apples without paying by one of the kids, who then tells his friends. But, it turns out that Peabody is paying for them in advance, and then picking them up later when he feels like it. This makes no sense. Who pays for an apple, or anything, in advance, and then walks into a store and grabs it and leaves? It looks like theft. What the kid saw looked like theft. Telling others is the right thing to do. The kid didn't make this up, like a tabloid story.
This weird behavior by Peabody earns him the rep of being a thief. When he finds out that the kid spread this "rumor (which is really an honest mistake by the kid)," he punishes the kid. The end.
There ya go, kids. Better keep quiet if you ever see big grown-ups doing weird stuff, or else you'll get punished like you deserve to be, you little brats.
Madonna is such a clumsy storyteller, it's obvious that no editor would dare to interfere in the contributions of a celebrity who thinks she's a genius in every area she dabbles in. I can only guess that the lack of mercy shown to the kid is somehow reflecting Madonna's own hard feelings toward the tabloid press, which produces rumors as a matter of course.
The pictures are good, but it's just a lousy book. Borrow it from the library if you must, and get disappointed with it, but don't buy it. And, if you don't want little kids being given the official website address of a woman who often depicts herself hanging naked from chains in an S&M club (remember her other book, SEX?), you might want to offer to buy the school or library another book, and ask them to please destory this one.
If the school teacher you speak with seems not to have a problem with Madonna asking little kids to visit her official adult website, do remember that Madonna dedicated the book to "teachers everywhere," so take the book and hit the teacher over the head with it a few times, as it has a roughly 8.5 X 11" hardcover footprint and might do a good job of knocking some sense into the teacher. Then, leave the book with the teacher who refuses to remove it from the school, take your kid, and go home to begin homeschooling, for in your home, YOUR decisions, and not those of the State, will be the final decisions.
 KLONK! goes the moral on your head February 12, 2007
4 out of 4 found this review helpful
The main good things about this book are the basic plot, adapted from Jewish folklore, and the Hopper-ish illustrations. In other words, the good parts of this book are the parts that have nothing to do with the author.
Celebrity books can be good, even very good!--such as the great picture books by Jamie Lee Curtis or the songbooks by Lithgow. But Madonna's writing is clunky, way too wordy, and a book about morality which doesn't even credit the illustrator on the cover seems hypocritical in the extreme.
Since it's the story that's great, please read __Feathers__, a lovely adaptation by Heather Forest.
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