Illustrator Georgia Graham, hooked on pastels since fourth grade, is known for her chalk pastel and chalk pencil depiction of country life in books such as Bibi and the Bull and Tiger's New Cowboy Boots. Graham, who lives on a small cattle farm in Lacombe, Alberta, presents a trademark West that is at once realistic and romantic. In The Saturday Appaloosa, Gramama, hanging laundry against a lavender sky, sports a softly wrinkled neck and elbows. The horses gathering at the barbwire fence are bright-eyed and muscular, yet washed in mauve and indigo. The big sky, the cat tails rimming the creek, even Gramama and Crystal are brushed with the same purple light. Turns out, unknown to Graham, the author, who arrived at a recent reading in purple denim pants and jacket, has a particular fondness for the colour purple. 0-88995-213-2 (2003)

[Spring 2003 BCBW]