The Disney classic Pinocchio is so entrenched in our collective imaginations that we forget the movie is based on a book by Carlo Collodi. There are many book versions of Pinocchio, some for children, some for older kids, and many for adults.

Here are a few that stand out:

• Pinocchio Picture Book by Carlo Collodi and Katie Daynes for ages: three years and up from Usborne Books. This traditional tale is warmly retold with colorful illustrations and captivating text.
• Pinocchio (Young Reading Series 2 Gift Books) as retold by Katie Daynes. This 64-page Usborne Book is for older children ages five to 12 years. This version also comes in a Pinocchio CD and book pack filled with lively music, dramatic sound effects and superbly characterized readings.
• Pinocchio (New York Review Books Classics) This is the grown up and original version where Pinocchio is one of the great subversives of the written page, a madcap genius hurtled along at the pleasure and mercy of his desires, a renegade who in many ways resembles his near contemporary Huck Finn.
• Pinocchio (Penguin Classics) In this version for ages nine to 12, Pinocchio plays pranks upon the kindly woodcarver Geppetto, is duped by the Fox and the Cat, kills the pedantic Talking Cricket, and narrowly escapes death, with the help of the blue-haired Fairy. A wooden puppet without strings, Pinocchio is a tragicomic figure, a poor, illiterate, naughty peasant boy who has few choices in life but usually chooses to shirk his responsibilities and get into trouble. This sly and imaginative novel, alternately catastrophic and ridiculous, takes Pinocchio from one predicament to the next, and finally to an optimistic, if uncertain, ending.

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