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BeverlyCleary ILLUSTRATED BY Tracy Dockray Contents Introduction v 1. Henry and Ribs 1 2. Gallons of Guppies 29 3. Henry and the Night Crawlers 59 4. The Green Christmas 88 5. The Pale Pink Dog 121 6. Finders Keepers 153 About the Author Other Books by Beverly Cleary Credits Cover Copyright About the Publisher Introduction WHEN I was the age of readers of my books I always skipped the intro-duction because I was so eager to get at the story. Then, if I enjoyed what I had read, I returned to what I should have read in the first place. If I did not enjoy the book, I ignored the introduction because I was not interested in what the author had to say. Now I find myself writing an introduction to Henry v Huggins, the book that was my first attempt at writing (I don•t count school assignments) fifty years ago. Please feel free to skip, but if you do I hope you will return to it. What can I tell you about this book? First of all, back in 1949 when I wrote it, I was surprised to have written it at all. Although I had dreamed of writing since childhood, I had no clear idea of what I should say. I assumed I would write about a girl.After all, I had been a girl, hadn•t I? Authors should write about what they know. Finally when I was in my early thirties the day came when the desire to write had gnawed at me long enough. I had been working in a bookstore during the Christmas rush where I was faced with trying to sell a book about a puppy that said, •Bow-wow. I like the green grass.Ž No dog I had known could talk like that. I knew I could write a better book. viI sat at an old kitchen table in an other-wise empty bedroomand sat and sat without a single thing to say about a girl. I watched the twittering birds in a eucalyptus tree. I let the cat out. I let the cat in. I doo-dled miserably with a few sentences about a girl and decided if I didnt enjoy what I was writing no one could enjoy reading it. I seemed to have spent my own childhood reading lib