Seeing and Believing

Valentina Cesaratto is a high-school teacher specializing in dramatic
arts and film studies.

It is 1910 and a young girl sits by the shore waiting for her father to
return home. Her father, who is a captain of a boat, has been away from
her and her mother for a long period of time. As she plays by the
water’s edge, she creates beautiful images and lets her imagination
run away. She builds a sandcastle and imagines herself a princess. She
looks out onto the blue water and imagines mermaids swimming about. She
looks up into the sky and imagines her father holding her tightly. She
looks at the clouds and sees beautiful angels at play. She collects
pebbles on the lakeshore to give as a gift to her father and imagines
the lake shedding tears because, like her, the lake misses her father.

Seeing and Believing is an absolutely delightful story. “The most
wonderful things take more than your eyes to see” is repeated over and
over, emphasizing how wonderful life is when you have your imagination
with you. The illustrations are amazingly fluid, graceful, and brilliant
with explosive colors and lines that bring us into the young girl’s
imagination. Highly recommended.