For their pictures are indeed just totally visually lovely and a marvellously descriptive feast for my eyes, and this even though I personally actually do tend Tom prefer and have always preferred natural looking trees to topiary. In other words, reading the featured text of The Night Gardener with its basic simplicity and indeed rather unimaginative and blah standard ending, at least to and for me, this seems to kind of pull down the pictures a trifle, it seems to distract from illustrations that with their lushness and attention to detail really do totally shine, but which glow is then if not extinguished at least dimmed and lessened somewhat by an accompanying narrative that I for one have found both more than a bit monotonous in scope and also much too alike and akin to other picture books featuring “special” gardeners.Īnd therefore, The Night Gardener really does only move and truly appeal to me aesthetically (read illustratively) and is in fact a much more positive and delightful reading experience if I try to as much as possible ignore Terry and Eric Fan’s verbal musings and only concentrate on their artwork. Truth be told, with Terry and Eric Fan’s The Night Gardener I have actually (and pretty rarely for me at that) both enjoyed the accompanying illustrations considerably more than the presented narrative and in fact have also found the Fan brothers printed words not really even remotely on par with their glowing and delightfully evocative illustrations. I’ll be on the lookout for more from the Fan Brothers. Hope and dreams and imagination live in this book.Ī beautiful tale to read again and again. We have to remember to look for the magic. Balloons, animals, smiles and more! Life can be hard and monotonous at times. Extraordinary pages alive with color and detail! You will see something new each and every time you look.

We wake up! Signs of joy start to appear in color on the pages. Come see! Take a walk down the lane!Īs the big, muted brown and grey pages begin to fill in with color, readers begin to really see every line and detail. The magic of the gardener’s work brings the people together to dream and guess and experience. Magic is out there for all to see, feel, find, and change us!Ī secret night gardener slowly transforms Grimloch Lane into a circus of wonder one tree and shrub at a time. Long after the “ooohs” and “aaahh”s fade away-the hope and energy of a creation or magical moment remain.

The Night Gardener is about the impression and long lasting effects magic and art can make on a soul and a community.

The night gardener picture book