This wordless book is one that I just quite don't understand. I'm not sure if the leaf is supposed to represent the boy's struggle for self-expression. The description says that this book will make you giggle uncontrollably while tugging at your heartstrings, but it actually made me sad. The illustrations are whimsical enough that my daughter loves to choose it as a bedtime book. ( )

Hand lettered sound effects, but no script. A bird drops a seed on a boy’s head, which begins to grow in his hair. The boy fosters the newly grown plant with help from his dog. He even has nightmares of caterpillars, plants, and gardeners trying to get his plant. Ultimately, the boys mother cuts his hair and the boy mourns the loss of his plant. Again with the help of his dog, he plants his hair and the plant. The plant grows into a tree, which the boy visits each year as he grows. His final visit is with his wife and family, at which point the cycle starts again as a new seed is dropped, but this time on the dog’s head! ( )

Here is the synopsis from the teacher notes: A carefree boy is doing cartwheels when a grownup tries to cut his long hair. He runs off and hides in a bush with his dog. A passing bird drops a seed into the boy’s hair.
The seed sprouts, and the boy cares for the seedling, watering it and sheltering it
when the sun is too hot. He dreams that it has all sorts of enemies.
Eventually his hair, along with the tiny plant, is cut off. But the boy continues to
care for his plant and watches it grow. And one day a seed from the now magnificent tree
is dropped by a bird onto his dog’s pup, where it too begins to sprout.

Here is the link to the teacher notes: http://bit.ly/1RPnMZR

I thought the main character was a girl until the very end, and I liked it better that way, but it's still a lovely book.

Told almost entirely through images, with the occasional sound-word thrown in, Australian author/artist Stephen Michael King's Leaf is an engaging tale of a young boy whose desperation to avoid a haircut leads to a very odd development. Racing outside to escape his mother, with her scissors in hand, he instead finds himself a planting pot of sorts, as a bird drops a seed on his head, and it takes root and begins to grow. Fortunately for the leafy plant in question, the boy knows just what to do to take care of it, and when the inevitable haircut does come, just where to transplant it...

I cannot say, in all honesty, that I enjoyed this one quite as much as some of Stephen Michael King's other picture-books - titles like Mutt Dog! and Henry and Amy:(Right-Way-Round and Upside Down) - but it was still an entertaining little romp. The artwork, which, by necessity, must carry the story, is engaging, and I particularly liked the depiction of the boy's canine companion. Recommended to children who enjoy wordless picture-books, and to fans of Stephen Michael King. ( )