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Cinderella, or the Little Glass Slipper
by Marcia Brown
Picture book · ages 4–8 · 1980
Why we'd hand it over
Marcia Brown's 1954 Caldecott winner (reissued 1980) is the gold standard—elegant, unsentimental illustrations and prose that honors the fairy tale without prettifying cruelty; kids feel the longing and the magic equally.