Art and Joy Best Friends Forever

What are the secrets of creativity (and other life-enhancing essentials besides)? Art and Joy of course, perfectly personified in this delightful and inspiring picture book.

Art and Joy are best friends and like nothing more than making stuff – using paper, a few crayons and a roll of tape for example, they can create a brand new planet, while old boxes are transformed into a wonderful floats, the fanciest parade in town. It seems there’s no end to their creativity until an Art bully arrives. It’s very loud and very grumbly, and its criticisms – ‘That is silly and weird’ – get inside Art’s head. Confidence undermined, Art refuses to make anything unless it’s ‘serious, normal, tidy and right’. Fortunately, a walk in the open air and an encounter with a dragonfly, dressed in every colour of the rainbow, restores Art’s creativity and soon, reenergised, our little maker is reunited with Joy. It’s not just children who will recognise the damaging impact of the inner critic, we all know what it’s like to feel that our artistic efforts are not good enough, or somehow silly, and we all need reminding how to overcome Art Bullies to find Joy again in the creative process. Art and Joy are proper characters and the story will bear multiple rereadings, while added treats include some activity suggestions.