The Ogress and The Orphans By Kelly Barnhill

Once upon a time there lived an ogress. The minute you heard the word ‘ogress’ you imagine a heartless, huge and cruel monster. The truth is that ogres are as kind as humans, actually there are more kinder than humans. Ogres can live for more than a thousand years. This Ogress found a village and lived among other ogres for a few centuries in harmony. One day she went out for some work, that is when a cruel dragon entered the village.

When I say dragon you imagine some sort of fire breathing creature which is true. But this dragon had a magic power which he used to dupe everyone. This habit of cheating everyone made the community of dragons kick him out, but that never stopped him. Being an outcast he came to the with village of ogres. Ogres here were rich and whenever someone in their community would die they would throw few coins. The greedy dragon saw this and an evil idea crept in his mind. He used his power, which was to become any creature he wants by wearing their skins. He became and ogre and started his plan of taking the money. When the other ogres watched up on what he did he burned the whole village.

The evil dragon

After performing this malicious act he decided to go and live among humans. He roamed and found a very unique village. In this village everyone helped each other selflessly and had a library. This library was their pride. If you were a visitor and came to this village the villagers would come to you and say “ Have you seen put library ?”. If you had seen it they would say “Surely you must see it again”, and would take you to their library. Of course the dragon noticed all this. One day he came to the village wearing human skin and claimed he was a dragon slayer. As usual people welcomed him with hospitality. He somehow convinced people that he should become Mayor. That night he burned their libraries and spirits.

The Mayor - AKA the evil dragon

People became stone hearted and only cared about themselves. The people who were most affected by this were the orphans who needed people’s support. Now they grew hungrier and poorer everyday. It was around this time the Ogress came to this village.

The starving but cheerful orphans.

The Ogress found an abandoned shelter and took refuge there. she made friends with a dog and crows. She cultivated the land to crow crops and domesticated sheep. She made everyone food in the village and asked the crows to give it to them in secret.

The Orphans who could speak Crow realised that it was the Ogress who gave them food.

They thanked her profusely. They also started making books for the people of the village. People once again started talking to each other. It was the books that brought them closer to each other. Whle they were talking realised that the Mayor was hoarding money. So they make the Dragon get away and the Ogress, the Orphans and all the people lived in harmony happily ever after.