"When I was little, my Grandad was my best friend. Grandad and I liked to go for walks in the woods together. We didn’t go very far. Or very fast. Or very straight. While we walked, I would ask him questions about things I wasn’t sure of. Why is it . . . ? What if . . . ? Does it ever . . . ? One day I asked my grandad about prayers."

Grandad explains that trees "pray" as they reach for the sky, that streams, rivers, lakes, and waters of all kinds pray, that the wind prays and sings at the same time. When people pray "a prayer is often its own answer." Grandad tells his grandson the wonderful ways that people pray. Finally the boy asks the hardest question of all. Are our prayers answered, Grandad? Then the grandfather dies, and the boy finds it is impossible to pray anymore. Then one day, after many many prayers and after the boy is grown, he discovers the woods again and finds his own prayers.

The naturalistic watercolors portray the woods and wild exquisitely. The grandad and the boy are rendered timelessly in jeans, corduroys, and plaids. The close-up of the boy in the grass with a tiny clover in his hand and the ground-level view looking up past the faces of grandad and grandson standing in the sunshine to the trees above depicts the spiritual without reference to a particular faith or tradition.

This beautiful book belongs in every library and every home. It’s for youngsters and elders, for families and faith communities. It is for everyone who has ever walked in the woods, whispered a prayer, or loved a wise elder.