A Giant Bully

Alison Buehler

Tall Tales for Small People:

Get ready to relive the magic of childhood with your children!

I S B N 978-1-63177-805-6

9

781631 778056

A Giant Bully

Tall Tales for Small People takes ordinary kids into a magical world where they address childhood problems. Feeling left out, bullying, learning to share, and a dozen other common childhood trials are cleverly solved in each book using brains, bravery, kindness, and magic.

US $14.95 CAN $16.95

51495

by Alison Buehler illustrated by Tze-Chiang Lim

www.mascotbooks.com Tall Tales for Small People: A Giant Bully

Š2017 Alison Buehler. All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form by any means electronic, mechanical, or photocopying, recording or otherwise without the permission of the author.

For more information, please contact: Mascot Books 560 Herndon Parkway #120 Herndon, VA 20170 info@mascotbooks.com Library of Congress Control Number: 2017900391 CPSIA Code: PRT0317A ISBN-13: 978-1-63177-805-6 Printed in the United States

by Alison Buehler illustrated by Tze-Chiang Lim

Once upon a time, in a little town not so far away,

there lived two ordinary brothers named John, who was six, and Sam, who was four. They lived with their mother and father, their dog Joy, and a grumpy cat named Augustus, who loved nothing more than to pee on their father’s pillow. They also had a little sister, Mary, who did nothing but eat and cry and sleep, so they did not count her yet.

They lived in a not-so-ordinary house. It was an old house their mother called a “fixer-upper” and Grandma called a “tear-itdowner.” The boys were never sure what this meant, but they loved the house because from it you could see The Big Lake and The Forgotten Forest from almost every window.

On this particular day, John and Sam had to help their mother go to the grocery store while their father looked after Mary. Both boys liked to ride in the cart’s basket.

“Hey!” said Sam. “John is sitting on my hand.”

“Owww!” said John. “Sam kicked my knee!”

Their mother sighed. “Help me look for some pineapples.”

“Sam doesn’t like pineapples, remember?”

“Yes, but you do. So do I, and so does your father.”

But instead of pineapples, the boys saw something else—a man yelling at a boy about Sam’s age. The man snapped,

“You never listen!” Then he raised his hand and

smacked the boy’s head. The boy started howling.

Their mother wheeled the cart down another aisle and said, “Boys, that was a mean man picking on a little kid. It is not okay to pick on people smaller than we are.”

She decided to leave the store without pineapples or juice or anything else.

Later that night, when John and Sam had read three books with their mother and said their prayers, John asked, “Mommy, when that man hit the little boy, why didn’t we do anything?”

“My brave boy,” she said. “I should have said something. Next time I’ll have to have some courage. Sometimes even big people aren’t as brave as little people with big hearts like yours. Now sleep tight. I love you both more than all the stars in the sky, and I’ll see you in the morning.”

Not long after their mother closed their door, Sam heard a tapping noise on the window. “What was that?”

“It’s just the wind,” said John, who had answers for everything.

But the tapping grew louder. Tap, tap, tap, tap, tap.

“No, there’s something out there,” said Sam. “There is not. I’ll show you,” said John as he pulled back the curtains.

“AHHHHH!” the boys screamed, jumping on John’s bed.

A real life elf-like creature looked at them. The elf stared for a minute, smiled, blinked twice, and knocked again. Tap, tap, tap, tap, tap.

“What should we do?” asked Sam. The elf didn’t look scary.

In fact, he looked too silly to be scary.

“I guess we should ask what he wants,” John said. “Hey, Elf Guy, what do you want?”

The elf tapped again. Tap, tap, tap, tap, tap.

“I don’t think he’ll go away until we open it,” said Sam, and he walked over to the window.

“Wait!” cried John. “He could be dangerous!”

“He’s very little,” said Sam. “Just like me.” He opened the window wide.

“AHHHH!” the boys shouted again. But the little elf

grinned and blinked. Sam decided to smile back at the creature. All of a sudden, the elf leapt and hugged Sam’s neck.

“I knew you were the tenderhearted princes! Princes of tender hearts,” squeaked the elf. Then he jumped down and snapped his fingers.

Sam’s eyes shone. Princes! He loved to play dress-up and spent most of his time fighting imaginary dragons and saving imaginary prisoners from evil dungeons.

“Perfect! Perfect!” squealed the elf.

“Who are you?” asked John.

The elf started to dance. He sang, My name is Elfin Moby.

I come from the land of Yalp.

I’ve come to br ing the pr inces

To save my brother from…

“Well, come on. I’ll show you. Show you I will! My brother Tavi is in BIG trouble. Trouble he is in! But first, under your beds you should look!”

John peeked under his bed first, and there, next to the clothes that should have been in his laundry basket, was a bow and arrow, just his size.

“Look what I found!” Sam said, pointing his smaller bow and arrow at the ceiling.

“Careful!” cried Moby. “Careful, you should be!”

The brothers looked at each other, nodded in agreement, and climbed out the window after Elfin Moby and into The Forgotten Forest that ran along The Big Lake. John’s heart beat fast. They followed him, trying not to trip, until they were deep in the forest.

The elf slowed, and they heard a deep voice.

The giant roared to the little elf in his hand, “You never listen!”

Just as he was about to hit Moby’s brother on his little head, Sam cried, “Stop!”

The giant turned around. Elfin Moby squeaked, “Quickly! Save my brother, you must! Your arrows! Your arrows! Now!” John drew back his bow, slipped an arrow under his index finger, and aimed. The arrow flew through the air and thwack! smacked the giant in the center of his forehead. The giant spun. Sam’s arrow hit him on the rear end before it bounced to the ground.

“All right!” shouted Sam as the giant staggered backward, holding his head and his hiney, and began to shrink. Down, down, down the giant shrank until he was no bigger than a hamster.

Elfin Moby and his brother ran and scooped up the giant between them. They put him in a little cage and shut the door.

“How does it feel to be little?” they laughed.

“Little, it feels bad to be!” The giant’s roar sounded more like a mouse now.

Elfin Moby bowed to the princes and said, “This is my brother Tavi. Tavi, my brother. Tavi was working off an old debt to that bully of a giant, giant of a bully. Last week he sent me a snail with a letter that said he could not take any more of the giant’s meanness. No more of that mean giant. I thank you both for teaching him a lesson. Lesson, you have taught him!”

“You’re welcome,” said John. “But we’re not princes.”

“Oh, one never knows! Never, one knows! All boys and girls are princes and princesses,” cried Tavi. “Now, I have heard human boys need lots of sleep. Follow us home. To home, you will follow us.”

Back at their house, the boys climbed in their window and put back their bows and arrows.

“Goodnight, Sam,” said John.

“Goodnight, John,” said Sam. “Goodnight, tenderhearted princes!” said Moby.

“Tenderhearted princes, goodnight!” squeaked Tavi as he disappeared.

“Princes!” said John, and they laughed until they fell asleep.

The magic is just beginning!

Use the link below to download a free list of my favorite activities and resources on teaching kids about bullying: www.alisonbuehler.com/resourcepage

Order the next book in the series Tall Tales for Small People: A Dreadful Dragon at Mascot Books! https://mascotbooks.com/mascot-marketplace/

—About the Author— Alison Buehler is an award-winning author who has worked as a special education teacher and a director of two nonprofit organizations. Her role as a mother to three children who were hungry for clever fantasy stories from a very early age sparked the series Tall Tales for Small People. You can find her at www.thehomesteadcenter.com or on her author site at www.alisonbuehler.com where there are links to activities for each book. She lives with her husband and three children, chickens, goats, and bees in Starkville, Mississippi.

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