Every bedtime. Puddlebend is waiting.
A shallow creek with one leaning gum tree, a lookout rock, a hollow log and a bend full of puddles, where seven friends decide every day whether to check first, go first, or just plop in.
09 books · 07 friends
Places in Puddlebend
The whole creek
The Bank
Home and safety; where every book starts and ends
The Lookout Rock
Sora's spot; the meeting place; where plans are made
The Hollow Log
The slightly scary place; what is inside
The Far Side
The new path; where Nix wants to be first
The Reed Shallows
Where Skip lives; the noisy place; night scenes
Cinder's Nook
Ownership and consent: the thing somebody needs is inside somebody else's collection.
The Root Steps
Scale reversal: the gaps that let the small friends run through are the gaps that stop the big ones.
The Quiet Patch
Listening: the friends have to make themselves understood without the loudest of them talking.
The Rain Bowl
Time pressure without danger: a short-lived chance that everyone wants for something different.
The No-Step Mud
A boundary with a reason: the rule holds when nobody is watching, or the thing it protects is gone.
The Wobble Walk
A shared thing built badly: it fails because each of them built their own end of it.
The Pebble Table
Sharing and invitation: gathering food or found things turns into who gets included.
Hush's Fork
Hiding that turns into asking: a private place somebody else is allowed to sit near.
The Little Drop
The same small obstacle read three ways: thrilling, annoying, or far too loud.
The friends who live in every book
The whole cast
Bramble
The steady big-kid guardian
Cinder
The nosy neighborhood explorer
Hush
The tall nervous big cousin who thinks nobody can see him
Nix
The littlest rocket sibling
Skip
The tiny little brother who cannot wait his turn
Sora
The tall watchful big-sister neighbor
Tuck
The littlest cousin who is always a bit too close
The opening spread of “The Missed Leaf”, exactly as the reader lays it open.
The Missed Leaf
After a bright little rain, Creek Park shone with silver puddles. 24 pages, about 6 minutes read aloud, for ages 2–7.
A little library.
Familiar friends.
Our reader for iPad and iPhone brings the first six stories together, with a place for your favorites and a way back to the page you left.
In testing for iPad and iPhone.
Explore the reader appPicture books made with the care of a small press.
- Written
- Each story is planned page by page and written to be read aloud — short enough for bedtime, rich enough to return to.
- Illustrated
- The same friends return book after book, drawn with care so a child always knows them by face, coat, and favourite thing.
- Finished
- Stories and pictures belong together, with room to pause, notice something new, and turn the page.