Title The Unicorn Treasury Series --- Editor Bruce Coville Illustrator Tim Hildebrandt Publisher Doubleday - 1988 First Printing Doubleday - 1988 Category Anthology Main Characters See below Main Elements Unicorns

• "The Lore of the Unicorn"
• "The Unicorn in the Maze"
• "Unicorn"
• "A Net to Catch the Wind"
• "Riddle"
• "The Valley of the Unicorns"
• "Ragged John"
• "Homeward Bound"
• "The Paint Box"
• "The Transfigured Hart"
• "The Unicorn"
• "The Snow White Pony"
• "What News the Eagle Brought"
• "Unicorn"
• "The Princess, the Cat, and the Unicorn"
• "Starhorn"
• "The Court of the Summer King"
• "The Strangers"
• "The Boy who Drew Unicorns"

Imagine that while all the animals of the earth were boarding the ark Noah built to save them from the Great Flood, the playful and frivolous unicorns - those magical, horned beasts - were too busy frolicking to join the others. And imagine that this is the reason there are no more unicorns on earth. Or are there?

Inside this complete treasury, stories and poems of the unicorn welcome the reader to a world of fantasy and dreams come true. An introduction, "The Lore of the Unicorn," heads the collection to acquaint readers with some of the history and legend surrounding the creature. This is followed by stories and novel excerpts from some of today's most popular fantasists including Madelein L'Engle, Jane Yolen, and C.S. Lewis, and poetry by Myra Cohn Livingston, Nicholas Stuart Gray, Ella Young, and others.

Beautifully illustrated from the critically acclaimed artist Tim Hildebrandt make this a book unicorn lovers will treasure for a lifetime. And remember, wherever they may have come from, and wherever they have gone, unicorns live inside the true believer's heart. Which means that as long as we can dream, there will be unicorns.

I had a faint feeling that maybe I had read this collections of stories before many years ago. I actually own Coville's other anthology, A Glory of Unicorns but I wasn't sure about this one. So I borrowed it from the library and when they handed it over and I saw the cover I was overcome by a sense of nostalgia. I had, indeed, read this book before. I even remembered many of the poems (oddly, not the stories).

Three of the stories are excerpts from other works. One is from The Last Battle by C.S. Lewis, a book I've read before and plan to read again later this year. One is from A Swiftly Tilting Planet by Madeleine L'Engle which I read just a couple weeks ago. And the third from The Transfigured Hart by Jane Yolen, a book I have not been able to find anywhere but really want to read.

There are almost as many poems as there are stories, and as I mentioned before, some of them were more memorable than the stories themselves.

But of course poems and excerpts do not make an anthology, it's the stories that count. While I enjoyed most of them, there were a few that really stand out, like Wrede's well known ability to make fun of fairy tale stereotypes (aren't all princesses just dying to spend the rest of their lives doing nothing but braiding flowers into a unicorn's mane?!?). There are stories told from the point of view of the unicorns, there are stories where the unicorn is more symbolic than real, there are stories of classic unicorns that visit pools and rest their heads in maiden's laps. And of course tales of the healing horn which cannot be taken by force without dire consequences. One thing missing are unicorns from other cultures like the Ki'lin that is peaceful and wise, or the Karkadann which is fierce and dangerous.

But this is truly a collection all unicorn lovers should own, especially if you can get your hands on the edition that is illustrated by Tim Hilderbrandt(who with his brother is famous for his Lord of the Rings art), whose unicorns are beautiful and magical to behold.