The Curious Garden

by Peter Brown

Book Overview

This gorgeously illustrated picture book opens to a detailed spread of a gray city. If you look closely, you can spot the tiny figure of a red-headed boy, Liam, walking down the street. THE CURIOUS GARDEN tells the story of how this young boy discovers a door that leads up to abandoned railroad tracks where he finds a forgotten garden. He cares for the plants and helps them flourish, and they gradually spread throughout the city, transforming it, bit by bit, into a lush, green world. With spare text and breathtaking illustrations, and a classic feel reminiscent of THE LITTLE HOUSE and MIKE MULLIGAN AND HIS STEAM SHOVEL, this is a magical picture book about the power that one small person can have to transform the world.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0316015474
• ISBN13: 9780316015479
• Release Date: April 2009
• Publisher: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
• Length: 40 Pages
• Weight: 0.99 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.4" x 8.8" x 11.1"
• Age Range: 4 to 8 years
• Grade Range: Preschool to Grade 3

Customer Reviews

Engaging, beautiful, and uplifting

This is such a fabulous, beautiful book. The art is wonderful. The words are engaging. The message is uplifting. It's worth adding to your library. It has a similar feel to Something Is Growing and On Meadowview Street.

Good Hearted Message!

I just absolutely love this book. The illustrations are beautiful. Almost real and surreal at the same time. Well written and simple but with a strong message - community, caring for the environment, growth, spreading the good and passing it forward. We saw the author and he is just adorable. I love the books even more knowing that this guy wrote them and illustrated them. He is just hilarious and charming and really good with kids...hmmm.. wonder if he has a girlfriend...I digress. It really is a great book. Good for families and great in classrooms.His other books are also topnotch. Illustrations are what makes them great.

Captivating

Whimsical and wonderful, this book is way more appealing to me than a lot of the cutsie kids books out there. It draws you in as the city transforms, page by page, from a dreary industrial wasteland into a beautiful urban oasis. The illustrations are edgy and beautifully done, leaving you wishing you were there. And all the while it's subtly teaching important values like showing what can happen when you take something "worthless" and give it new life, which I think is a crucial lesson within our throw-away society. It also reinforces the ideas of community, being eco-conscious, and commitment. I look forward to reading this to my daughter for years to come.

Perfect for Spring!

How perfect that this is coming out now to celebrate Spring! The story and the pictures made me want to share this with my gardening friends as well as the children in my life. Another great book beautifully illustrated by this author.

Loved this book...

The "curious garden" is absolutely beautiful as it wends it's way around a drab, brown city. My 4 year old son (who also happens to be named Liam), loves pouring over the full spread illustrations of the garden. And I love the message of spreading a little green in the world.