The Heart and the Bottle by Oliver Jeffers

Download it once and read it on your Kindle device, PC, phones or tablets. While the subject of loss always has the potential to unsettle young readers, most should find this quietly powerful treatment of grief moving. The Heart and the Bottle - Kindle edition by Jeffers, Oliver. In the final spread, as she sits reading in her father's chair, a thought balloon exploding with childlike and cerebral images alike makes it clear that she is once again at peace. Conversations between the girl and her father appear as balloons with images in them instead of words his answers to her enthusiastic “questions” about the world are expressed in scientific prints and diagrams.

) artwork is the sweetness in this bittersweet story. All the bubbly curiosity that had made her sparkle disappears, “but at least her heart was safe.” Not until the girl, now considerably older, meets “someone smaller and still curious about the world” is her heart restored to her. The colourful pages are not only indicative of the landscapes they depict, but later reflective of the young girl’s emotions.When a small girl loses her father, her only parent (Jeffers represents the loss with the father's empty chair in a moonlit room), she decides “the best thing” is to put her heart in a bottle and hang it around her neck. The contrast between the bold use of colour on some pages and the plain white background on others is striking. The lines and illustrations convey meaningful and powerful messages to readers. The sensitivity through which the difficult subject of loss is explained and illustrated is what captivated me. She finally decides it is time to get her heart out of the bottle. She grows up but loses her interest in the world around her, until she meets a young girl with the same curiosity and wonder she had had when she was a child. To avoid feeling pain, the girl takes her heart and puts it inside a bottle. One day, her grandfather is no longer a part of her life and his chair is empty.

There is a young girl whose mind is filled with curiosities and wonders of the world, things she experiences with her grandfather. Through powerful metaphor, the human ability to compartmentalize the painful experiences of death, separation, and loss are shown in a way that young readers can see and understand. It is a heart-warming tale of love, loss and the grief and pain that accompany loss. The girl puts her heart into a bottle, and much later in her life, attempts to free her heart from that same bottle. “Feeling unsure, the girl thought the best thing was to put her heart in a safe place.” Author: Oliver Jeffers Illustrator: Oliver Jeffers Publisher: Harper Collins Children's Books

The Heart and the Bottle by Oliver Jeffers