Podría Haber Sdo Peor

by A.H. Benjamin, Tim Warnes (Illustrator), Teresa Mlawer (Translator)

While walking home, an "unlucky" mouse suffers minor mishaps which repeatedly save him from being eaten by various animals

Genres: Picture Books, Childrens, Animals, Fiction, Fantasy

32 pages, Library Binding

First published January 1, 1998

About the author

A H Benjamin has been a children's writer since the mid-eighties. He has been published by Andersen Press, O.U.P, Little Tiger Press, Franklin Watts, Q.E.D and many other big publishing houses. He has written 34 books which have sold worldwide with 22 translations including Chinese, Korean, Turkish, Greek and Arabic. His books are very popular in schools and libraries. He currently ranks 345 in the UK PLR. Also some of his work has been adapted for radio, television and theatre.

He lives in Lincolnshire with his wife, Trisha. They have four grown up children and four young grandchildren who have all been an inspiration to him.

(Sources: Amazon.com author page, Little Tiger Press author page, Hachette Children's Group author page.)

Reviews

[Areej Kiwan · Rating 4 out of 5]

قصة جميلة .. عن فأر يتعرض للكثير من المواقف السيئة في رحلته للبيت لكنه لا يعلم أنه نجا في كل موقف من أن يكون فريسة لأحد الحيوانات ..
القصة جميلة لتعليم الاطفال الرضا و رؤية اللطف في كل المواقف .. و جميل فرصة ربطها بالله و اسماءه بشكل مبسط للاطفال .. فالله المدبر و الحافظ و اللطيف .. و طبعا كلها قيم و معاني يمكن ان نستنبطها مع الطفل اثناء قراءتها ..

[Hank Sutherland · Rating 5 out of 5]

"It Could Have Been Worse", written by A.H. Benjamin and illustrated by Tim Warnes, is a charming book about looking on the bright side of life. The story follows Mouse, who goes through rough circumstances throughout the day. He falls into a hole, sits on a thistle, and slips into a stream. Unbeknownst to him, however, there are multiple predators trying to make him their dinner. Eventually he makes it back home and tells his mother about his rough day, although she soothes him by saying that it could have been worse. The illustrations in this book are splendid. The larger-than-life nature makes the images seem to pop off the page. It is easy to relate to the size of the mouse, and we see animals such as snakes and cats in as large of a way as Mouse does. I thoroughly enjoyed this book. The vocabulary on this book is simple, and so I would recommend it for Kindergarten. I chose to present this book for class because the illustrations are large and easy to see, and the story is accessible to a wide audience. Despite it being a paperback, this book is a solid choice to present to children.

[Dulce German]

This story is about a mouse heading home and how he gets into accidents all the way home but doesn’t realize that he was close to dying every time by being eaten. The book is structured into a storyline we can follow all the way to the end, we also see how there is some worse that could happen to us. The illustrations seem to be painted, you can see the brush strokes on the pages. I like how in the book we can see that when the mouse goes through something and the other animal is following him, the other animal also gets hurts. I think this book can be good to teach students how to see the positive things in their day even if they are having a hard day.

[Alli Divin · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book It Could Have Been Worse is about a mouse who experiences a really bad day. Through many different trials and terrible things, he reaches home and sees his mother where she reassures him that he needs to look at the brighter side of things. In the classroom, I will use this book to help students feel better and look at the brighter side of a bad day.

[Klarida Shehu · Rating 2 out of 5]

The story was simple and easy to follow, which was reflected by the pictures also.
It is really aimed at much younger children such as nursery level because of the repetition and simple phrasing on each page.
The message is clear, not complaining and being thankful but it became quite laborious to read and keep an older child's attention (year 1).
Overall it was a nice story.

[Pi]

Bardzo pozytywna książeczka, której filozofia życia potrafi uratować najgorszy dzień. Ogromnie podoba mi się ta historia - wyraźnie pokazuje, że szczęście czasem wygląda jak pech, ale przecież... zawsze może być gorzej.
Ilustracje także na plus. Radosne kolory i kochana myszka.

[A. Foster · Rating 5 out of 5]

I liked this one for sure. It is funny how we look at the world and think things have just been terrible, but have no idea what could have happened... Counting our blessings ...

[Tamara Zann · Rating 4 out of 5]

It has a story told through the illustrations as well as the words. It's a cute read.

[Rolf · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not really teaching anything (beyond some basic animals), but plenty cute.

[Alessia · Rating 4 out of 5]

para as crianças aderirem o estoicismo

[neen · Rating 2 out of 5]

For some reason this book made me so incredibly angry. Why can’t we validate his frustration comprehensively and also promote awareness of more dire situations other mice must face.

[Grace Duthie · Rating 4 out of 5]

* A witty story.
* Teaches not to worry if things go wrong and to always look on the bright side- it could have been worse!
* A good story to get children thinking about the link between text and illustration. You have to look at the illustrations carefully to understand the story.

[Hannah Hart · Rating 4 out of 5]

As a cute little mouse travels home he has a pretty rough day of falls and bumps and bruises. However, he doesn't realize that the animals trying to eat him have an even worse day as the little mouse escapes and they fall into harmful scenarios. The little mouse learns that even though he had a bad day it could have been worse.

I like the positivity in this book. I love the mom at the end of the book that tells her son it could always be worse. It's so true that it could always be worse and we need to spend more time looking at the bright side.

Kids make a mountain out of a molehill sometimes and this book when be a great one to help teach kids that some things are not worth getting upset over. Making a bad great or losing at recess are not the end of the world. It could always be worse.

[Lindsay · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a great story to use to help pre-schoolers build their narrative skills. In this story, Mouse is on his way home and has several mishaps, including falling in a hole and falling in a river. While lamenting his bad luck, the illustrations show that Mouse could have been another animal's dinner had it not been for these mishaps.

I used this for a mice-themed Spanish story time program (I'm also using it for bilingual story time). I encouraged the kids to tell me what could have happened if Mouse hadn't, for example, fallen in a hole. (Had he not fallen in the hole, a bird could have eaten him.) It's a great story to elicit participation.

[Amy · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is one of the few books in which the pictures are really necessary to tell the story. I'm very text-oriented - I find that I really have to make myself stop and look at illustrations.
In this one, the text only tells about Mouse's bad luck - you have to look at the pictures to realize that each 'bad' thing that happens to him is really an escape from something that would be much, much worse!

[Katie · Rating 5 out of 5]

The title describes the attitude of the book. When children are having a rough time and think that nothing can be worse, this book could intervene in that thought and help them realize that they can get past their situation. The illustrations are bright and keep the readers attention. Great for read alouds for children of all ages. The book may be an early elementary level, but the message is for everyone.

[Hope · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book has repeating words and offers another perspective to a bad day, because it could always have been worse. The words are simple and fun. I think this book would be great to use for early elementary students to make obvious predictions. In addition, when students are learning to infer, the main character has emotion in the illustrations and this can be used to discuss an introduction or reinforcement to the concept of inferring.

[Hannah Smith-Morgan · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love this little book. It has a fantastic moral. This little mouse goes on a journey and he is constantly encountering trouble, but the animals that attack him suffer worse fates. It's such a cute story because at the end the mouse realizes that even though bad things happen to him, it could have been much worse. This will really teach students that bad things do happen, but that there are always some who are worse off.

[Shelby Kesterke · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved the moral of this book, and highly recommend reading it. A.H. Benjamin did a great job with the illustrations and it really helped tell the moral of the story. The text was short and easy to read.

I would use this story in the classroom to teach students the lesson of being grateful and that when they think things are going rough that they should always keep a positive attitude and to never give up.

[Ky · Rating 5 out of 5]

Poor mouse is on his way home but thinks he is having bad luck. This is my 5 year olds favorite book. It's a book that can be used to show that things are not always a bad as they seem. The pictures are big and bright and can be seen around the room. It's simple words and pictures make it easy for youngsters to follow along with.

[Mara Meyer · Rating 5 out of 5]

We all go through times in our lives that things could have been worse off. I think this book does a great job describing and showing the illustrations in which things could have been much worse. However in the end everything worked out for the best. We all need to understand that life throws us challenges but things could always have been worse:)

[The Brothers · Rating 3 out of 5]

A little mouse travels home through the woods and encounters a variety of unfortunate predicaments (falling out of tree, tripping down a hole, falling off a log into the stream). He thinks he is the most unlucky of all creatures, but little does he realize that his bad luck has saved his life more than once!

Cute illustrations.

[Diane · Rating 4 out of 5]

Poor mouse! He’s having a terrible day ... or is he? With every small problem Mouse encounters, he escapes a much bigger problem, though he never sees the bigger problem, only the reader does.

A cute story with simple illustrations. The repetitive phrase and Mouse’s oblivious natures makes this a fun read aloud. Also a good example of a positive mindset.

[Dusty · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not a great book -- but certainly passable for children's literature. I picked this up in my search for "picture books" that can serve as introductions to literary concepts and elements in my freshman English class this year. This one's chore? Dramatic irony.

[Lindsey · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think this book offers a cute message to children that something could always be worse. It is also a great book to use for predictions. Kids will get a kick out of it because what they would expect to happen is typically not what happens.

[Emily Griffith · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a super cute book! The illustrations were fantastically done—really showing emotions along with some funny scenes. This book showed that there can always "be worse" and emphasizes on looking at the positives.

[Keegan Taylor · Rating 3 out of 5]

Cute. I liked that you had to pay attention to the illustrations to get what was going on. It's a bit about perspective, too, and that should make for an interesting discussion.

[Cassandra · Rating 4 out of 5]

Loved the message behind this book. My kids love it.

[Kerstin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Such a great kids book. A clever way to teach about being thankful for what you have.

[Jen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mouse is heading home and all sorts of things get in his way, but as we see animals trying to eat Mouse get even more tangled and trapped, we realize that things could always be worse!