Books like Butterfly Park
By Elly MacKay
For the kid who's just moved somewhere new, or who wants to fix a problem by getting everyone involved, this is the story that says your idea can turn into something the whole town joins. Quiet, hopeful, and softly beautiful, with a gentle sense of everyday wonder.
A quiet, gentle ghost joins the Whittaker family on their seaside holiday, only to discover their rented cottage already has an occupant: a noisy ghost who needs help learning how to be useful.
A young girl finds a box of yarn that never runs out and knits sweaters for everyone and everything in her gray town — until a greedy archduke decides he wants the box for himself.
A chameleon changes color wherever he goes and longs to keep one color of his own, so he settles on the greenest leaf — until autumn turns it yellow, then red, right along with him.
A tiny snail longing to see the world hitches a ride on a humpback whale's tail, and together they sail to icebergs and volcanoes — until the whale gets stranded and needs the smallest friend to save her.
A small boy is invited to tea at the palace and always asks the same question — may he bring a friend? — and each time, a surprising animal guest shows up beautifully behaved.
Three traveling monks arrive in a war-weary village where suspicious neighbors hide their food and shutter their windows — until the monks offer to make soup from nothing but stones.
A girl named Treva notices her family's Christmas decorations and presents mysteriously vanishing, and when she tracks down the culprit, she finds two trolls who have never had a Christmas of their own.
After a hunter kills his mother, a young elephant flees to the city, where a kindly old woman takes him in — then he returns to the great forest with his cousins Celeste and Arthur to become King of the Elephants.
A lion wanders into the library one day, and since there aren't any rules against lions, he stays — quiet-footed, story-hour pillow, rule-follower — until an emergency forces him to break the one rule that matters.
When every girl at the Paris boarding school falls sick on Christmas Eve, the smallest and bravest one stays well enough to take charge — and finds unexpected help from a magical rug-selling merchant.
A girl in a red cloak walks alone through the woods to visit her ailing grandmother, unaware that a wicked wolf is following close behind with plans of his own.
A kind, beautiful maid comes to live in a mysterious castle with a Beast, where animals in period dress attend them both — and her capacity to love may be the only thing that can break his spell.
