In the Meadow of Fantasies written by Hadi Mohammadi, illustrated by Nooshin Safakhoo, and translated by Sara Khalili is the story of one girl’s imaginative escape from her own time and place.

A young girl with braces on her legs looks up at the seven-horse mobile above her bed, inspiring her to imagine a story she later calls Seven Nights and Seven Moons. In the girl’s story, six of the horses know their true selves, from favorite colors to the spots they call home to the dreams they each have for themselves. But the seventh horse doesn’t know any of these things about itself, and the six other horses give up parts of themselves to the seventh to help it discover its place in the world. At the end of the book, the horse brings these stories to the young girl, which she compiles into Seven Nights and Seven Moons.

As the girl imagines the horses coming to life, careful observers will see a horse–notably "colorless" like the seventh horse in the story–disappearing into the girl’s closet. This scene is very sparse in color, and when the story inevitably circles back around to the girl in her bed, the illustrations–as well as the formerly colorless horse who is now walking out of the closet–are full of color and life. And, sweetly, the girl’s pajamas now match her multi-colored horse friend.

In the Meadow of Fantasies published earlier this week from Elsewhere Editions.

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