Wind Child

by Shirley Rousseau Murphy, Leo Dillon (Illustrator), Diane Dillon (Illustrator)

Illustrated by the winners of two Caldecott awards, a story touched by fantasy and legend features the daughter of a human mother and the East Wind who longs to fly like the wind but can only imitate it through her weavings.

Genres: Picture Books, Childrens, Fantasy

40 pages, Library Binding

First published April 23, 1999

About the author

Shirley Rousseau Murphy is the author of over 40 books, including 24 novels for adults, the Dragonbards Trilogy and more for young adults, and many books for children. She is best known for her Joe Grey cat mystery series, consisting of 21 novels, the last of which was published when she was over 90. Now retired, she enjoys hearing from readers who write to her at her website www.srmurphy.com, where the reading order of the books in that series can be found.

Murphy grew up in southern California, riding and showing the horses her father trained. After attending the San Francisco Art institute she worked as an interior designer, and later exhibited paintings and welded metal sculpture in the West Coast juried shows. "When my husband Pat and I moved to Panama for a four-year tour in his position with the U. S . Courts, I put away the paints and welding torches, and began to write," she says. Later they lived in Oregon, then Georgia, before moving to California, where she now enjoys the sea and views of the Carmel hills.
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Reviews

[Cheryl · Rating 5 out of 5]

Omg, the art. The story is fine, gracefully told, original, with a good message. But the art, by "The Dillons" as listed this time, Leo and Diane Dillon on most of their books, is wonderful!

I don't have energy to say everything I love about it so I'll pick one. I love how the young woman *very subtly* grows from an apparent age of 17 to probably about 27 over the course of her independent career... I can't figure out how the drawings of her changed, as she didn't get sturdier or coarser or wrinkle-lined or less lovely or graceful, but I could definitely see that she was maturing, gaining in wisdom and experience. Brilliant.

Do find this in your library before it's culled due to not being a shiny new book.
Or if you can't, go to openlibrary.org and read the scanned copy.

[Betsy · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very interesting book! Illustrations capture the "windy" feel of the story with horizontal lines, waving hair, and soft pastel colors. Sculptures (done by the Dillons' son) accent the white space in the between the facing pages.

[Meredith · Rating 3 out of 5]

The daughter of the East Wind, unaware of her parentage, experiences a longing for the winds the she does not understand as she works as a weaver and searches for a husband.

This picture book features the extraordinary artwork of Leo Dillon and Diane Dillon.

[Elizabeth · Rating 3 out of 5]

After reading a Joe Grey book by this author I studied her somewhat and found out that she wrote this picture book. So I was curious and it was available in Infosoup! I would describe the story as fantastical and wispy. It reminded me of selkies or any other natural creature that can shape shift and marry a human. In this case, the wind is the natural partner. They have a child who looks for their true love one day. Sometimes we seek like and sometimes we seek opposite.

[Inhabiting Books]

Resshie grows up ignorant of her true parents, but with a strange longing and affinity for wind. She supports herself by weaving cloth, and soon her cloth is the most coveted in the land for its special unearthly qualities. But Resshie, in weaving cloth for others, realizes she is lonely and wants a husband like other girls. Not liking anyone in her village, Resshie sets out to make her perfect companion, with imperfect results.

This story reads like a Greek myth and fairy tale rolled up into one. The text flows beautifully. My girls sat silent and rapt as the story unfolded. Each picture has a dreamy, windswept feel to it, and each contains the omnipresence of wind: hair blowing, dresses blowing. And the conclusion is perfect.

This book seems to be out of print, but you should be able to find it at your library. I highly encourage it, especially if you or your children like myths and fairy tales.

[Nicole · Rating 3 out of 5]

I still giggle at my little girls who looooove this book. I was never so romantic, but they are both romantic to the core. I guess I find it so amusing because I did nothing to encourage that and I'm not like that myself. I think most children would be puzzled by this book (the story of a wind and a woman who fall in love but she dies after having their baby, and the wind gives the child to someone else to raise... the child grows into a beautiful woman who feels lonely because she feels she belongs somewhere else)... anyway the girls ask me to read it over and over again.... unless your children are deeply, hopelessly romantic, you might want to skip this one.

[Melanie]

Reads like a fable- some adventure

[Michael Fitzgerald · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very nice illustrations, but the story is awkward and lacks focus.

[Sara · Rating 5 out of 5]

Epically romantic fable/fairytale/myth. Beautiful.