If you knew and loved the work of Tomie dePaola (1934 - 2020), this book will touch an especially tender place in your heart. A celebrated author and illustrator, dePaola created more than 260 children's books, many of them now classics like Strega Nona, The Knight and the Dragon, and The Clown of God. In 2011, he received the Children's Literature Legacy Award for his lasting contribution to literature for children.
Even if you are new to Tomie dePaola, this last completed text of his is bound to touch your heart because of its subject: Brontë, dePaola's dog. It was written shortly after Brontë's passing and tells with sweet simplicity the details of their life together: how dePaola held Brontë on his lap for their first drive home, how Brontë spent his first night in a crate and then whimpered a little, so dePaola lifted him up to sleep on his bed ... "for the next twelve and a half years."
Illustrator Barbara McClintock superbly blends dePaola's style with her own, capturing Brontë's vivacious character in a perfect match with all the times dePaola tucked him into earlier stories. Through her pictures and dePaola's words, we, too, fall in love with this dog. But every few pages, the opening refrain returns, aching with the dog's absence: "Where are you, Brontë?"
McClintock only met dePaola briefly a few times, but she got to know him through this text, getting inside the manuscript to "create a visual narrative side by side with the words." When dePaola writes, "I bought you a pink collar, and I think you liked it," McClintock gives us six entire panels of the pair together: Brontë sporting the collar while they read a story, watch television and share popcorn, play fetch, zip off in a convertible, etc.
Near the end, we read, "The day you left me, I knew I would miss you." The understatement strikes the heart deeper than a flowery abundance of words would. We miss Tomie dePaola, too, yet are ever so grateful to Barbara McClintock for bringing this last book to life.
