A Stone for Sascha

"Aaron Becker is another author who publishes quite a lot of wordless picture books. His stories tend to be about journeys and going through slightly magical places. This one begins in a very familiar situation of the death of a family pet and the grief of the little girl. There is a page, all white with just her in the middle, which is very much an expression of her grief. But at the same time, it’s a book that attracts you because of the colours in the cover image. They’re unusual shades of blue, and then suddenly a gold that stands out. You begin to see how that gold colour has a particular place within the book, through the journey of this golden-coloured stone. One image at the start shows a little girl facing the water. You can tell from how she’s very still and her expression of grief, and possibly of anger, when she’s remembering her dog. As she throws a normal stone into the water, there is a change of scene which takes us out into space and we see how a meteor evolves over time, through nature as well as humans, into the golden stone she finds in the ocean. The universe gives her back a gift that connects her with the story, including her own ancestors. Again, you can read the book very quickly and not notice the clues that show that some of the people in it were part of her own family history. It is about the material objects that connect us to each other over space and time."