About the Author

Charlotte Craft studied comparative literature at Columbia University in New York. After graduating, she traveled to Japan, where she worked as an interpreter and photographer. She now lives in Scotland with her family. The New York Times complimented her first book, Cupid and Psyche, for its "clear, simple text" and noted that the book a "excels in conveying the mythology."

In addition to Cupid and Psyche, she is also the illustrator of Marianna Mayer's Pegasus, Baba Yaga and Vasilisa the Brave, and The Twelve Dancing Princesses. Ms. Craft lives in Connecticut.

Reviews

Gr 1-4-Like the previous Craft collaboration, Cupid and Psyche (Morrow, 1996), this gloriously and elaborately illustrated Midas is faithful to the myth (in Hawthorne's redaction). A sharp eye will spot a few Anatolian visual clues in an otherwise baroquely splendid fantasy of a medieval court, rendered in meticulous detail. Excess never looked better. Libraries with budgets of gold might want both this volume and John Stewig's King Midas (Holiday, 1999), illustrated by Omar Rayyan: they make a fascinating and instructive pair. Lacking the Midas touch, librarians must choose between the essentially conservative Craft approach, as unsurprising and toothsome as Turkish delight, and Stewig's much more flavorful and inventive recipe. If readers want the Hollywood spectacular, Craft is for them, but the innovative team of Stewig and Rayyan would get my vote in a heartbeat.-Patricia Lothrop-Green, St. George's School, Newport, RI

The mother-daughter team structures this adaptation like a fairly tale and take their inspiration from Nathaniel Hawthorne's retelling of the Greek myth. PW called it "a regal treatment." Ages 5-up. (Oct.) Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.