The Wonderful Adventures of Nils

Nils is a little boy who causes trouble wherever he goes, especially among the animals on his farm. One day he captures an elf and when the elf gets free, he changes Nils into an elf. Nils takes off with the family goose, joining wild geese migrating over Sweden.

The author weaves lots of intriguing folktales and stories into her book, folktales and stories that are more interesting and unexpected than the typically moralistic children's stories of that time. For me, these stories and folktales were the best part of the book.

Nils grows in character as he experiences many trials on his trip with the geese, and that is interesting and unexpected, too.

The descriptions of Sweden? Whew. Very, very detailed. I could have done with much less of that.