Review by New York Times Review
THE High Line, an elevated freight train track on Manhattan's West Side, out of use for nearly three decades, has inspired many visions of reclamation. Steven Holl, an architect, described it as "a suspended green valley in the Manhattan Alps." Just a glance at photographs of the eerily beautiful site makes you immediately understand why. The city and developers, however, thought otherwise, wanting to demolish it. Thanks to the devoted efforts of a community group, Friends of the High Line, the abandoned track is now in the midst of being transformed into a park and promenade, the first portion of which will open to the public this June. Its revitalization was the inspiration for a quietly marvellous picture book, "The Curious Garden," by Peter Brown. Young Liam is the only walker on the streets of an urban dystopia where residents - no surprise - prefer to remain indoors. Brown's first acrylic and gouache spread pictures the metropolis as bleak and forbidding as one of Charles Sheeler's cityscape paintings, its only visible inhabitants factories, high-rises and roadways. The only movement comes from plumes of smoke joining the polluted haze of the beige sky, and the only sign of life comes from red-haired Liam and his red umbrella and rain boots, tramping through his sepia equivalent of Dorothy's Kansas, a solitary explorer. One rainy day, he sights a stairway leading up to an elevated train track, and climbs it, discovering a patch of wildflowers and plants struggling to survive amid the tracks. As inventive as Chowder, the bulldog in Brown's two picture books (who saw bones not merely as tools for dental hygiene but as artistic supplies), the dedicated Liam is determined to turn this mangy growth into a garden. But first he has to turn himself into a gardener, which Brown captures with the gentle, mischievous, affectionate humour that permeates his delightful tale. No Edward Scissorhands, Liam gives the poor plants a near crewcut with his pruning, and almost drowns them by overwatering. "The plants patiently waited while Liam found better ways of gardening," Brown dryly narrates. Liam persists. In the fallow season of winter, Liam prepares for spring by reading books on gardening and gathering the tools and skills to bring his secret garden to full bloom. Nature is much as a character in the story as Liam is, and their relationship develops into a companionable and nourishing - on both sides - friendship. As the garden blooms and spreads along the track, Brown depicts its progress with the bright Technicolor palette of the Land of Oz. The sky glows a glorious blue, and verdant moss and dazzling wildflowers, the product of Liam's tender gardening, expand into the city, nature's nature turning out to be as adventurous as the boy's. Moss and ivy warm high-rises and wildflowers decorate sidewalk cracks, as all variety of gardens and greenery begin to take root in the city, along with a fleet of budding gardeners, truly transforming it into an Emerald City that is oasis, playground and canvas - check out those topiaries! As all good, enduring stories are, "The Curious Garden" is a rich palimpsest. Echoing the themes of "The Secret Garden," it is an ecological fable, a whimsical tale celebrating perseverance and creativity, and a rousing paean, encouraging every small person and every big person that they too can nurture their patch of earth into their very own vision of Eden. Sherie Posesorski's young adult novel "Shadow Boxing" will be published in August.
Copyright (c) The New York Times Company [October 27, 2009]
Review by Booklist Review
In a city without gardens or trees or greenery of any kind, a young, curious boy, Liam, discovers a few spindly flowers on an elevated train track. With pruning shears and water (and a few songs), he nurtures the little patch until it thrives and starts to spread. Soon, the entire track is covered in lush green. Throughout the snowy winter, the boy dreams and reads about plants, and when spring comes, his flowers inspire more gardeners all over the city. The simple words have a lyrical, rhythmic quality that will read aloud well, and they reinforce the sense that the natural world is a living, breathing character. It's the illustrations, though, that will engage kids most. Combining panels with full-page illustrations and many wordless spreads, the pages show the city's inspiring progression from a dull, dreary place to a fantastical, organic metropolis. An image of Liam on a stealth gardening mission, disguised in sunglasses, hat, and pint-size trenchcoat as he deposits sod and flowers onto a concrete strip, will amuse kids, even as it prompts them to think about unusual places gardens could grow in their own communities. An author's note about the story's real-life roots concludes. For more books about young gardeners, see the accompanying feature, Read-alikes: Green Thumbs. --Engberg, Gillian Copyright 2009 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Brown's (Chowder) latest is a quiet but stirring fable of urban renewal, sure to capture imaginations. In exploring his bleak city neighborhood, thoughtful Liam-in Brown's warm, almost fuzzy acrylic spreads, he looks a little like a friendly, redheaded wooden puppet-notices that some flowering plants have appeared on an old elevated railway track. He teaches himself to care for them ("The flowers nearly drowned and he had a few pruning problems, but the plants patiently waited while Liam found better ways of gardening"), and the garden responds by "growing restless. It wanted to explore." In one of several wordless spreads, Liam stands against a bright blue sky, surrounded by a thick patch of daisies. Spring brings a burst of new energy: "the tough little weeds and mosses set out first. They popped up farther and farther from the railway.... but the most surprising things that popped up were the new gardeners." In Brown's utopian vision, the urban and the pastoral mingle to joyfully harmonious effect-especially on the final pages, which show a city filled with rooftop gardens, fantastic topiaries, windmills and sparkling ponds. Ages 3-6. (Apr.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by School Library Journal Review
Gr 1-3-"There once was a city without gardens or trees or greenery of any kind." Thus begins an eco-fantasy in which Liam climbs a stairway leading to abandoned railway tracks and discovers wildflowers and plants struggling to grow. Initially an inept gardener, the boy improves with time, and the garden begins to prosper. He continues his work after the winter snows, and diverse city residents of all ages join in the effort. Plants that spill over onto the letters of the title page foreshadow the glorious flowering to come. But first, readers experience, via Brown's framed acrylic and gouache spreads and vignettes, a smog-filled metropolis bereft of outdoor inhabitants except for Liam, who doggedly explores its dreary streets. Flat, stylized paintings depict the gradual greening of the city. Dark skies gradually become a strikingly blue home for birds; red buildings appear amid the gray ones; and the stark beginning endpapers transform into lush green flower-filled pages at the end. In a lengthy note, Brown explains that this fantasy is based on his real-life discovery of the defunct High Line elevated railway in New York City where he found plants growing amid the rubble. While the story lacks tension and is at times sentimental, the art is spectacular and the book might inspire children to engage in small projects to improve their own neighborhoods.-Marianne Saccardi, formerly at Norwalk Community College, CT Copyright 2009 Reed Business Information.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Horn Book Review
Liam, who lives in a slightly surreal "city without gardens or trees or greenery of any kind," turns an abandoned railway into a green paradise. When his garden overruns the city, it's cause for celebration, not complaint. The book's look-for-beauty-where-you-least-expect-it message is best delivered in a series of dramatic acrylic and gouache wordless double-page spreads featuring the fruits of Liam's labor. (c) Copyright 2010. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
