Vietnamese Folktales for Children - Phuoc Thi Minh Tran - ★★★.¾

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AUTHOR: Phuoc Thi Minh Tran
ILLUSTRATORS: Dong Nguyen & Hop Thi Nguyen
GENRE: Children's Picture Book, Folktales
PUBLICATION DATE: October 22, 2024
RATING: 3.75 stars.


In a Nutshell: A bilingual folktale collection for children, containing ten traditional stories from Vietnam. Great intent, but the English execution was somewhat mixed. Fabulous illustrations, though.


This book contains ten stories from Vietnamese myths, legends and folktales.

As the tagline suggests, these are “Stories of Adventure and Wonder”. All the tales contain an element of the fantastical, whether through dragons or gods or talking animals. Most of the stories are great examples of lore, with a rich flavour of the local culture and beliefs and an ample dash of magic.

The tales are written in parallel English and Vietnamese versions, with alternating blocks of content switching between the two languages – English in black text and Vietnamese in dark brown. This could be a great option for parents who want an interesting way of introducing their kids to the Vietnamese language. I cannot comment on the Vietnamese version, but the English version is in fairly simple language, making this a manageable read for kids aged 6-12. It should also work well for read-alouds. However, I did find the continuity questionable in a couple of instances.

A couple of the tales aren’t proper stories but more like an informative essay on a god or a ritual that sprung up through a myth and is followed even today. I’d have preferred all the stories to be actual narratives.

Every story comes with a moral, but honestly, none of the morals impressed me much. They are generic, vague adages that, in most cases, have no direct relation to the story and seem to spring out of nowhere. It would have been better to skip the morals this once as they are too commonplace and ad hoc to be impactful.

One USP of this book is that it comes with an audio version in both English and Vietnamese, available for free on the publisher’s website.

The illustrations in the book are quite good. Right from the humans to the animals and the mythical creatures, the vibrant graphics will delight little readers.

The book begins with a note to parents and educators highlighting the importance of folktales and bedtime reading – don’t skip this.

All in all, a good option for those wanting to explore the rich fables and lore of another culture. The morals might not have worked for me, but a majority of the stories will hit the target for the right age group.

My thanks to Tuttle Publishing for providing the DRC of “Vietnamese Folktales for Children” via Edelweiss+. This review is voluntary and contains my honest opinion about the book.

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