The Curious Garden by Peter Brown
The Curious Garden by Peter Brown had me in love as soon as I laid my eyes on it. See, my other love is gardening. If I wasn’t blogging about books than I probably would be blogging about gardening. I’m not a pro by any means but I love gardening so much that I did get my Master Gardener certification which basically leads me to believe that I halfway know what I’m doing sometimes. What I love about gardening the most is the visualization. Taking a space and seeing it for what it could be. I hate bareness. I love creating something out of nothing. I adored every single page of The Curious Garden because it spoke to my gardeners heart.
In The Curious Garden, Liam is out exploring his very gray city in which there isn’t any kind of gardens, trees or greenery. Nobody ever went outside. Why would they? It’s dark and dreary. But Liam discovers a railway that had long stopped working and on the railway was the most startling discovery. A little patch of struggling wildflowers and plants that are in desperate need of a gardener. Liam didn’t know anything about gardening but he figured it out and as he did so the garden began to grow. It wasn’t content to stay in one place and so the garden began to “explore.” Slowly the garden began to overtake all that was barren and to turn the gray city to green. And more gardeners began to pop up as well. The entire city had blossomed.
I loved how many of the spreads were wordless. I loved the illustrations. They are just perfect. Absolutely perfect. I just want to pour over this one. Obviously, this book is about taking care of the earth but it’s not preachy. If anything, it’s about being thoughtful. About nurturing something and reaping the awards. It’s about creating something beautiful out of something that once was dreary and ugly.
The adult in me thought that this book was wonderful. I want it all for me. One that I will enjoy sharing with my boys and to let them know how important greenery is to me. And man . . . the illustrations are killing me.
Links of interest: Peter Brown website, more book blogger reviews, The Curious Garden is a Fiction Picture Book nominee for the Cybils for which I’m a panelist.
Genre: Fiction Picture Book. Approx ages 4-8.
Publisher: Little Brown. April 1, 2009.
Hardcover, 40 pages. ISBN 0316015474
The Curious Garden is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s, and Amazon.
