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by Lance Lee (Author), Nathalie Toro Retivoff (Illustrator)
This is a fable of what happens if you try to seize beauty and freeze time, serious yet whimsical, full of myth and magic, contemporary reality and joyful fantasy-centered around a cat always in danger of being too big or too small. It is set long ago, a "Once Upon a Time" story that unfolds seamlessly among modern children and their parents and School in a contemporary urban setting.
This is a fable of a woman long ago who tries to keep her beautiful daughter to herself, yet is so saddened that things wilt in her presence and die at her touch when she loses her daughter to a handsome stranger-and who magically lives into the modern era nursing her resentment until she meets a little girl called Daisy. Everyone and everything blooms in Daisy's delightful presence, who has a 'green thumb' to challenge all green thumbs! Try as she does, the sad, now old, woman has no effect on Daisy until the mysterious gift of a kitten, Little Boots, brings Daisy and her family to grief. For the kitten won't stop growing-until their neighbors and the other parents and children at School turn on Daisy and her family-and the local Council decides Little Boots may be a rare, semi-mythical English 'Beast' and must go, along with Daisy and her family.
Climactically Daisy discovers it is all the Old Woman's doing and finds how to reverse what has been a subtle spell on Little Boots, facing then the problem of keeping her cat from growing too small. The children and parents confront the Old Woman, who retreats before Daisy, at whose touch flowers grow and the Old Woman's wooden home bursts into growth.
Parents will find as much to enjoy in this "fable for children and their parents" as their children, who will all want a garden as beautiful as Daisy's and a family as happy!
