Graven Images

Paul Fleischman, in his Newbery Honor winning book, spins three engrossing stories about the unexpected ways an artist's creations reveal truths — tales whose intriguing plots and many moods will entertain readers and inspire future writers.

Can wood, copper, or marble communicate? They can if they are the graven images in Newbery Medalist Paul Fleischman’s trio of eerie, beguiling short stories. If you whisper a secret into a wooden statue’s ear, will anyone find out? Can a wobbly weathervane bearing the image of Saint Crispin, the patron saint of shoemakers, steer a love-struck apprentice toward the girl of his dreams? And if a ghost hires a sculptor to carve a likeness of him holding a drink to a baby’s lips, what ghastly crime might lie behind his request? And, in an afterword, the acclaimed storyteller reveals how he found his own author’s voice."From the author of The Half-a-Moon Inn; three polished tales set in the past and told with dexterous application of old genre techniques...Fleischman establishes a storyteller's hold on his audience; they can put themselves in his hands with the assurance that they won't be disappointed—and that all the surprises will be well within the established conventions." —Kirkus ReviewsPaul Fleischman won a Newbery Medal for Joyful Noise: Poems for Two Voices and a Newbery Honor for Graven Images. He is the author of numerous books, including picture books, young adult fiction, poetry, plays, and nonfiction. Paul Fleischman lives in Santa Cruz."A pox on the stars!" continued the voice. "Too bright for my liking. Aye, blinding, they are!"

Zorelli studied the speaker in wonder. He was short-legged and burly and missing an ear. Fitfully, he glowed and dimmed, as if he were made of starlight himself.

"You're Zorelli, the stone carver, if I'm not mistaken." His clothes were ragged and glimmered like their wearer, as if they were the dying embers of their former selves.

"And who - or what - are you?" asked Zorelli.

"What am I?" The apparition snorted. "Why, a ghost! What else did you take me for?"

Zorelli stared at the spirit in awe, his hands fluttering like moths. He wondered where Angelina had gone, and had he not been trapped at the end of the wharf he would gladly have fled as well.

"And what brings you - here?" the sculptor stammered.
"
What brings me here," said the specter, "is you."

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GRAVEN IMAGES by Paul Fleischman. Copyright (c) 2006 by Paul Fleischman. Published by Candlewick Press, Inc., Cambridge, MA.