“Listen to the lives of the long-ago kids, the world-fighters, 
the parent-unminding kids, the improper, the politeness-proof, 
the unbowed bully-crushers, 
the bedtime-breakers, the raspberry-blowers, 
fighters of fun-killers, fearing nothing, fated for fame.”
                -Zach Weinersmith, Bea Wolf

                Since I first got my hands on Bea Wolf last Sunday, I think I’ve read those opening lines to four different people. I’ve called people up to read them out loud. I’ve listened to friends read them out loud. I’ve read them out loud with my partner, twice, and also some other wonderful passages from later in the story. 
                Bea Wolf retells about the first third of the Beowulf story, except the heroes are kids and the monstrous Grendel is a horrible adult whose touch turns kids into adults. And more than that, for me, Bea Wolf is an utter delight to read. The sounds. The rhythms. Syllables that taste sharp as radishes or smooth as fresh whipped cream. Reading, I wonder, when did I first fall in love with that, the sound of words made into a game, a campfire, a frantic of friendly feast? “Snip-snap-snout,” my fairy godmother (my mom’s good friend, and a long time Waldorf teacher) would say after a story, “This story’s told out.” Or “Jabberwocky” when it was only sounds and dreams to me. Or bedtime songs my mom sang. Or Yoda sayings. I have lines of poetry that taste like winter evenings. Lines that are deep and mysterious as falling asleep. Lines that glow with fairy wings. I read a lot, these days, but it’s gotten easier somehow to miss that magic. And Bea Wolf brings it rushing back with hands sticky and dirty from candy and dirt, and ready to keep playing.