Quest

Two friends have a surprising encounter as they interrupt their bike ride to shelter from rain in a park. A strangely dressed king emerges from a doorway and urgently thrusts a mysterious map in their hands before being whisked away by two soldiers.  Armed only with the map, a few magic crayons and an exotic purple bird as companion the friends go in search of the king, narrowly escaping danger at every turn as they are pursued themselves.

In this beautiful wordless picture book, Aaron Becker continues the adventure begun in his earlier, highly acclaimed book Journey. Through the narrative power and beauty of his detailed watercolour illustrations Becker creates a magical world of fantastic castles, underwater ruins, tropical islands and snow topped mountains with echoes of ancient or lost civilisations.

Becker enables his characters to have control of their own destiny; with their magical crayons the children draw various contraptions and amazing creatures to help them escape capture; including an elephant, an octopus and a gigantic dragonfly. However it is the power of light and colour which eventually prevails when the purple bird accompanying the children flies off with their crayons creating a brilliant rainbow which dazzles and overpowers their adversaries. This leads to the King’s rescue and brings light and colour to his dark and gloomy kingdom.

Quest is a fantasy adventure story celebrating not only the power of imagination, but also the power of art to create magical worlds and tell wonderful stories. This book is the second in a trilogy by Aaron Becker, so more delights to come!