One day, Stella finds an abandoned bus in the city street right in front of her house, "where no bus should be." She quickly sees its potential. "It could be... ours," she says. Dad comes home to "an old bus where the front yard used to be." The bus, with a hand-painted sign like a nametag that reads "Heaven," quickly becomes a makeshift community center for her friends and neighbors. Snails make silver trails beneath it, sparrows nest in its engine, the children play around it, and the grown-ups give it a makeover, mopping and scrubbing the bus. They play games, read comics, show movies, and one couple even falls in love in Heaven.
Graham lovingly renders a subtle message of one person perceiving the beauty and potential in another's castoff. When Heaven's towed away to a junkyard, Stella helps even the junkyard owner to see Heaven's new purpose in her life and the lives of others--including a newly formed family of sparrows. Stella comes up with a solution and a good home for Heaven, where all her neighbors can still enjoy it. Stella goes beyond recycling and give community project a whole new celebratory meaning. --Jennifer M. Brown, children's editor, Shelf Awareness