Moving stories of the first as well as other Christmastime stories evoke children's wonder at the season's simplest gifts. Throughout the volume, stories simultaneously instruct, console, and even amuse us, such as the accounts of the impoverished hunter who, for lack of a bullet, shoots a deer with a cherry pit and then harvests a crop of fruit from the animal; or the penniless young man trying to win over the family of his loved one who heeds a voice that tells him soon he "will be sad but glad" if he picks up stones on his journey to her house. These cuentos continue a rich oral tradition in which stories appeal to our emotions and their impact is experienced long after the telling. "A viable contemporary portrait of an age-old tradition."—Professor Enrique Lamadrid, University of New Mexico"