This beautifully designed picture book opens a window into how author-artist and craftsman Ashley Bryan (Can't Scare Me!) resuscitates found objects as expressive puppets.
"Ashley, what will you name me when my garment is complete?" the book begins, as Bryan holds high a puppet draped in a texture that resembles fur, its head a metallic gold. Stained-glass scenes dangle from the top of a pine window frame, and bundles of fabrics, yarn and other artistic ingredients top his workspace in orderly disarray, along with "treasures, washed in from the sea" surrounding Bryan's island home: shells, driftwood and glass polished by many waves. Next, Bryan introduces eight puppets made from his treasures, lined up as if for a curtain call in a double-page photo, the first of four such spreads. (Readers get the answer to the opening question with the final line-up.) Bryan presents storytellers such as Spider ("I'm Spider Anansi./ I spin without rest/ A close web of stories/ For cradle and nest"); creatures of the sea like Pepukayi, a frog wedded to a mermaid; and leaders such as Abayomi, "Ruler of People," who delivers a heartwarming message: "I stick up for others/ So all may live free;/ I'm grateful for antlers/ That stick up for me." The Spirit Guardian ends with inspiration: "When you close this book/ And look up,/ You'll see puppets everywhere."
Readers will be on the hunt for their own found objects, and will return to these pages over and over to see how Ashley Bryan breathed life into these marvelous characters. --Jennifer M. Brown, children's editor, Shelf Awareness