As Novalis said, »Everything is a fairy tale.« But not all fairy tale anthologies are like The Giant Book of Fairy Tales by Tatjana Hauptmann – a true classic for the entire family, a book of magical beauty. This collection of the 100 best fairy tales from Europe is magnificently adorned with a colourful and enchanting palette of 600 drawings and watercolours.

Eleven-year-old Tanya is going out of her mind with boredom. What use is a sunny beach if she has to take care of her little brother Boris all the time? But then, while diving, she finds an old, stone-encrusted tankard. She tries to open it – and suddenly a strange little man creeps out of the bushes. His trousers are tucked into top boots, his shirt is covered in lace, and he is sporting a moustache almost as long as the braid of hair on his head. The little man chases after Tanya, explaining that they have an 'astral connection' and that, unfortunately, he must now fulfil her every wish, for she has broken the tankard in which he has been imprisoned for the last three hundred years. At first Tanya thinks that the man is crazy, but then she remembers a fairy tale and a cartoon film in which a spirit fulfils wishes. Are you some sort of genie? she asks the old man. A genie?!! I am a magician, he replies indignantly. A magician, I tell you – and a great magician at that!

An exciting story revolving around a few wrong letters on which a lottery win of 100'000 earthworms depended. If only the pig hadn't got such terrible trotters…

The two funniest and oldest, yet eternally young, rascals in literary history – a new edition illustrated by Tatjana Hauptmann. The tremendous success of this illustrated version of Mark Twain's ›The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn‹ proved beyond doubt that Tatjana Hauptmann is one of the most talented illustrators of all time.

The world-famous story of the wondrous transformation of the miser Ebeneezer Scrooge, with enchanting illustrations by Tatjana Hauptmann.

Freshly discover a world literature classic: Franz Kafka's ›The Metamorphosis‹, atmospherically illustrated by Tatjana Hauptmann. »Prague, 25 October 1915: Dear Sir! You wrote recently to tell me that Ottomar Starke will be illustrating the cover of ›The Metamorphosis‹. I just had a little shock. It just occurred to me that he might want to draw the insect itself. Not that, please not that!« Franz Kafka sent this pleading request to Kurt Wolff publishing house in 1915. Tatjana Hauptmann, who has illustrated a number of texts for Diogenes (most recently Theodor Storm's ›Little John‹) also kept to the author's wish: In her sensitive pencil drawings, Gregor Samsa's disturbing world comes profoundly to life right in front of our eyes.

For all those who have always shied away from the sheer length of the original Urs Widmer has carefully abridged the wonderful Tales From the Arabian Nights while preserving their oriental flavour. Highly vivid and amusing, he recounts the six most famous tales of the immortal Sheherazade: The Fisherman and the Jinni, Alibaba and the Forty Thieves, Aladdin and the Magic Lamp, The Magic Horse, The Adventures of Haroun-al-Raschid, and Sinbad the Sailor.
As Hermann Hesse pointed out, the original of this great collection of fairytales is »a source of infinite pleasures and the most opulent picture book in the world«. To ensure that this holds true, Tatjana Hauptmann has richly illustrated this work, conveying Oriental lavishness and subtlety.

A children's book by John Irving? Indeed, nothing could be more natural – as no other author has handled the themes of childhood, adolescence and the coming of age as well as Irving. Sometimes children's stories are hidden within stories for adults – one has only to discover them. ›A Sound Like Someone Trying Not to Make a Sound‹ is the adventure of a brave young boy who has a bad dream, and sets out with his father in the middle of the night to find the source of a ghostlike sound – and chase it away.