The pruning shears

Every child knows the situation: It’s summer and there’s a family party in the garden. As the adults chatter away, the children have to find something to do. This book’s main character is a girl with huge, blue glasses and a big, red mouth. Bored, she crawls under the table. Here she sees the adults’ feet and crazy toes—some are crooked, some have yellow nails, others are long, blue and thin. But oh! What has mother has left over by the hedge? It’s the garden shears! Clip, clip, clip, the garden shears clip off the toes under the table. How will the guests get their toes back, and who’s missing the little pale toe?

The pruning shears is a tribute to the child’s imagination. A delightfully funny and politically incorrect children’s book that kids from the ages of 4 to 7 will adore.

About the author

Gertrud Tinning, a graduate of the Danish Academy of Creative Writing for Children’s Literature, debuted with the novel Like Small Soldiers in 2013. The rights to her novel, An Unfair Time (2019), have sold to several countries. She teaches at the International Folk High School in Helsingør.

Louise Thrane Jensen is a graduate of Denmark’s School of Design and won the Cartoonist of the Year Prize in 2019. She was nominated for the the Ministry of Culture’s Illustrator Prize in 2020 for The pruning shears.

Text translated by Sharon Rhodes