Me and Mr. Mah

Spalding, Andrea. Me and Mr. Mah. Illus. Janet Wilson. Victoria, BC: Orca Book Publishers, 1999.

Following his parents separation, Ian leaves farm life behind and moves into the city with his mother. Their new moonscape of a yard doesn't look anything like the farm, and Ian misses his father intensely. But on the other side of the fence is a lush green world of sunflowers and Chinese vegetables tended by Mr. Mah. Through a common love of gardening, the two neighbours become friends and exchange stories about farming days in rice paddies and prairie fields. Each has a precious box of memories from a time and place now gone, but the two friends also create new memories together as they explore the city (which, from the images of Chinatown and the Chinese cemetery by the ocean, appears to be Victoria, BC). The watercolour paintings are lush and appear saturated with sunlight. On most pages one full-page illustration bleeds over into a smaller painting on the facing page, leaving plenty of white space for the text. In one spread, however, the two figures sit in the centre foreground while one side shows a remembered scene from a rice paddy and the other a prairie field. The gutter is the divide between scenes, but the rich ochre colour scheme ties the two fields together and underscores the connection between the two characters in relation to their former lives and losses. A beautiful and touching story about loss, change, loneliness, and friendship across both age and culture.