Review by Booklist Review
Award-winning illustrator Schwarz uses a playful metaphor for cultivating creativity in this encouraging treatise on imagination. A cast of kids, rendered in simple, splotchy ink lines, finds dragons in a wide variety of objects--branches and leaves, swoops of watercolor, a jumble of letters, laundry drying on a line. Noticing is the first step; next, readers are instructed to "hold it carefully and look and listen to find out what it wants." From there, the dragons take more concrete shape (though still retaining the loose quality of a creation crafted by a child) and bound around the pages. Schwarz shows how creativity can come from a wide variety of places; one spread exploring inspiration from music renders the booming beats of a drum in overlapping, stamped circles of translucent paint that coalesce into a bubbly, friendly-looking dragon. With lively, light illustrations and lyrical text, this artful depiction of an esoteric set of feelings nicely captures the freewheeling, open-ended nature of creative play and invites children to find inspiration absolutely everywhere.
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
A conceptual picture book that uses dragons as metaphors for creativity. Schwarz leads readers on an adventure of discovery, guiding them to find their own artistic voices through everyday objects and activities. She moves through various scenarios where children might discover dragons--falling from trees after storms (to the unobservant, they look like twigs), hiding in paintbrushes, emerging from musical instruments, or taking flight through dance. The mixed-media illustrations combine loose line drawings of children with vibrant watercolor washes and collage elements, producing compositions that feel deliberately unfinished--an apt style for a title that emphasizes process over results. Schwarz's palette shifts from warm reds and oranges that pulse with energy to cool blues that suggest calm focus, soon bursting into rainbow spectrums during moments of full creative expression. Bold circular shapes and flowing gestural marks dominate the visual landscape, reinforcing themes of movement and energy. Pairing large, bold typography with dispersed visual elements, Schwarz employs generous white space to let individual creative moments breathe. Fans of the work of Hervé Tullet and Peter H. Reynolds will likely appreciate this story that captures a youngster's spontaneous spirit. Educators and parents seeking to spark inspiration in little ones will especially welcome this tale. Characters have skin the white of the page. A creative catalyst sure to spur young artists.(Informational picture book. 3-7) Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
