Author Hester Bass brings an obvious fascination with and appreciation for her subject to this elegant narrative about artist Walter Anderson. A prolific artist of the mid-twentieth century, Anderson created paintings, sculptures, and many other works. Bass focuses on time Anderson spent on Horn Island on the Mississippi Gulf Coast. He would spend days on his own, observing, writing, drawing, and painting. Captivating details, like when Anderson found bunches of bananas washed up on the shore for seven or eight miles, or the time he rode out a hurricane, punctuate a story set against E. B. Lewis’s lovely watercolor illustrations. A lengthy biographical essay following the story includes photographs of some of Anderson’s work. For Anderson, who struggled with mental illness, solitude in nature was essential to his emotional and psychological well-being. Sadly, parts of his artistic legacy were destroyed in Hurricane Katrina. (Ages 7–10)

Enter the fascinating world of reclusive nature-lover Walter Anderson — perhaps the most famous American artist you’ve never heard of.

Residents along the Mississippi Gulf Coast thought Walter Anderson was odd, rowing across twelve miles of open water in a leaky skiff to reach Horn, an uninhabited island without running water or electricity. But this solitary artist didn’t much care what they thought as he spent weeks at a time on his personal paradise, sleeping under his boat, sometimes eating whatever washed ashore, sketching and painting the natural surroundings and the animals that became his friends. Here Walter created some of his most brilliant watercolors, work he kept hidden during his lifetime. In a beautifully crafted picture book biography, writer Hester Bass and Caldecott Honor-winning illustrator E. B. Lewis pay homage to an uncompromising American artist.