My 6 year old got a few Horrible Histories books out of the library last week. She reads them on her own during the day and then we read a bit to her at night before bed. Anyway, tonight, I was reading the Stormin’ Normans to her and there was a story about someone who wrote a fake letter to a Pope in the Middle Ages, pretending to be a king of some far off magical land, and the Pope believed it and replied. The book then continues: “this would be a bit like writing to Father Christmas … nice for 5 year olds to believe in, but a bit silly if you’re the Pope!”
Erm… wtf?! The series is apparently aimed at 7-12 year olds… is it really necessary to put that in there?? 7 is still young enough to believe in Father Christmas, isn’t it?? Luckily I stopped reading before I got to the Father Christmas bit, but DD is a good reader and was looking over my shoulder, so she was like “wait, what was that bit?? No, keep reading the next bit” but I said no, it’s really late and time to go to sleep and closed the book, but then she looked really sad and worried so I think she at least saw some of it.
I know I kind of am being unreasonable… I had already guessed that Father Christmas wasn’t real at that age, but I feel like I would still like to keep it going longer for DD if I can… any ideas of what I can tell her in the morning? If we don’t read it to her, she’ll just dig out the book and read it for herself.