Every photo in this book is a puppet: clay heads, felt shirts, cut-paper mountains, built by the Giramundo theater troupe of Minas Gerais. They've told this story on stage since the 1970s, and the pages read like their set was caught mid-performance.
The legend: a woman cursed for loving a priest turns into a headless mule with fire pouring from her neck, every Thursday night until dawn. Zé do Conto, a puppet narrator, tells it in rhyme, drawing on the version told in the Jequitinhonha Valley.
The story is genuinely spooky, which is the point of a ghost legend. The fear comes from atmosphere and shadow, not gore, and it plays closer to a campfire story than a bedtime one.
One thing to know before buying: the text is Portuguese only. This is a pick for a family that reads Portuguese, is learning it, or wants a read-aloud with a translation app open.