The little gardener

George, a gentle fellow who talks with plants and animals, tends his own small garden. Instead of a lawn, he cultivates a meadow with dandelions, daisies, and clover. After hearing him describe the formal garden next door, one of his little daisies longs to live among its splendid flowers. George sadly digs up the daisy one night, sneaks into his neighbor's yard, and replants it there. The next morning, the haughty neighbor angrily pulls up the ""weed"" and tosses it onto the compost heap. George is near despair, but that evening, after a friendly nightingale flies down and retrieves the wilting daisy, he replants it and falls asleep listening to the nightingale's song. The story is simply told and beautifully illustrated in sunlit and moonlit scenes that contrast the regimented, formal garden with its wild, though lovingly tended, counterpart. First published in Germany in 1985, this large-format edition showcases Watts' luminous artwork. Taken literally or as a fable, this picture book will appeal to children through its sense of empathy and its love of nature.--Carolyn Phelan Copyright 2019 Booklist

A gardener transplants a daisy into his neighbor's lawn with surprising results. Originally published in German in Switzerland in 1985, this unassuming story of George, an aging gardener able to converse with flowers, birds, and animals in his small garden, offers a surprising lesson in contentment. George prefers his "lovely meadow, dotted with red and white clover, dandelions, and daisies" and his untamed wild roses and bluebells, to his neighbor's formal lawn and garden with its "splendid roses, stately delphiniums, noble lilies, and elegant carnations." Describing the neighbor's flowers to his own modest blooms, George feels badly when a small daisy complains that it, too, wants to grow "next to roses and lilies" instead of "weeds." George secretly transplants his discontented daisy into the middle of the neighbor's pristine lawn, but the angry neighbor removes the daisy, tossing it onto the compost, leaving George to orchestrate a rescue. Delicately drawn, softly edged, pastel illustrations sharply contrast genial George, embracing everything in his small, bucolic, borderless garden with its wildflowers, untrimmed trees, twittering birds, and scurrying hedgehogs, with his scowling neighbor, who violently ejects a small offending daisy from his large, formal, rigidly bordered beds of perfectly positioned flowers, pruned trees, artificial birds, and garden gnomes. Children will easily see that difference. Both gardeners present white.The grass is not always greener in this simple, gentle, beautifully illustrated tale. (Picture book. 4-8) Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.