1. Environment
2. Fossils
3. Geography
4. History
5. Nature
6. Time
7. Weather

‘It begins one stone at a time – reading down / turning pebbles over / searching for a story stone.’

Mark Greenwood might be describing his own lifelong collecting or the process of putting together the text for this book. The cover is incised as if carved, and the endpapers are a glittering cabinet of curiosities - an appropriate opening to this monumental book.

Coral Tulloch’s previous depictions of the natural world in books are memorable, but Mark Greenwood’s words lead the reader into a new demonstration of her mastery. Her soft pencil and colour encourages the reader to see rocks and stones as individual creations and a volcano as a cauldron. Her skilful use of sepia backgrounds suggests the passage of time and a wonderful double spread where tiny humanoids haul and work with rocks suggests ancient embroidery. The book ends with her image of the earth tumbling through space : the ultimate stone.

In illustrating belief systems developed by observations of the heavens, Tulloch’s fine line drawing has inked a complex chart on the left hand side of a double page spread. The mythical figures that we know as ‘star signs’ fill the circle with their vibrant movement, with corners squared off with decorations of compass; the phases of the moon in a comical crescent procession; a sun with a star on its forehead and the wind depicted as a cloud, blowing with puffed cheeks. On the facing page, birthstones sit below Greenwood’s text, labelled only with Roman numerals to denote birth months – leaving the reader to guess which is which from the artist’s colouring, shapes and context. The whole book is an open invitation to pursue enquiries that arise from the visual clues and poetic words.

1. Walker Books Classroom Ideas for ‘The Book of Stone’. Mark Greenwood Author website https://markgreenwood.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/Book-of-Stone-Classroom-deas.pdf
2. Australian Government Geoscience Australia, ‘Australian Gems’ Classroom Resource https://www.ga.gov.au/education/classroom-resources/minerals-energy/australian-mineral-facts/australian-gems
3. Scitech Particle Earth News, Rockwell McGellin, ‘How the Bungle Bungles Got Their Stripes’ 11 March 2020 This online newsletter is produced by Perth’s science education museum Scitech https://particle.scitech.org.au/earth/how-the-bungle-bungles-got-their-stripes/
4. Children’s Books Daily 11 Nov 2019 ‘Book People: Mark Greenwood’ by Megan Daley, includes a review of ‘The Stone Book’ and a Q&A with Mark Greenwood https://childrensbooksdaily.com/book-people-mark-greenwood/
5. Paperbird Children’s Books and Art features Mark Wilson in his studio talking about ‘The Stone Book’ https://paperbird.com.au/people/mark-greenwood/
6. Wikipedia, ‘Stonemasonry’ History of humans working with stone https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stonemasonry