Helen Ward, author, and Wayne Anderson, illustrator, have created one of those beautiful books I’d like like to share with everyone from our pre-school grandchild to friends two or three generations older.

The Tin Forest surprised me because it was recommended by our church curriculum for my middle-grade Sunday School class, but when it arrived, I discovered that nowhere in the book is God mentioned, or Jesus, or anything biblical.

But the book is a springboard for discussion of hope, renewal, and kindness regardless of one’s religious or non-religious belief.

Then one day across the barren plain
the wind swept a small bird.
The old man spilled crumbs from his sandwich…
But the next morning, the visitor was gone.”

Helen Ward, The Tin Forest

You see hope come to life in Wayne Anderson’s (and the old man’s) art.