Telephone of the Tree by Alison McGhee

"You know what she told them? To stop it. To go away. 

That she was waiting for Kiri to come home."

Early in this story there are fragments or tiny hints that Kiri will not come home. Ayla thinks about the significant events from their past together such as drawing trees in their second grade class when Mr Nesbitt said to draw 'what you want to be when you are thirty' and both Ayla and Kiri draw trees. A telephone appears in Ayla's tree. Ayla has no intention of using it, after all it is not connected to anything, but others want to use the telephone and one of these is a little boy with the nickname Gentleman. He is mourning the loss of his pet lizard named Sweetheart. The death of this beloved pet is another tiny story hint about the absence of Kiri. Then the pizza guy uses the phone to call his dad. Then another person comes - a dad with his tiny baby who wants to talk to his wife.

"The pizza guy told me about this telephone. He comes here and talks to his dad when he needs to."

The trees in this street are all markers of life and death. Ayla can name each tree and match it with a birth or the end of a life. Then she sees a new tiny birch tree has been planted and her anger flares.

Reading this book needs to be gentle quiet experience - you already know the outcome or the destination, so it is important not to race to get there but rather to slow down and let the story gently unfold. And yes, even though I knew Kiri was not coming back I cried when Ayla finally allowed herself to revisit the awful events that led to death of her friend. 

Raw and sad but lit with occasional glints of humor and ending, as it should, on a rising note. Kirkus Star review

Publisher blurb: Ayla and her best friend Kiri have always been tree people. They each have their own special tree, and neighbors and family know that they are most likely to be found within the branches. But after an accident on their street, Kiri has gone somewhere so far away that Ayla can only wait and wait in her birch, longing to be able to talk with Kiri again. Then a mysterious, old-fashioned telephone appears one morning, nestled in the limbs of Ayla's birch tree. Where did it come from? she wonders. And why are people showing up to use this phone to call their loved ones? Especially loved ones who have passed on. All Ayla wants is for Kiri to come home. Until that day comes, she will keep Kiri's things safe. She'll keep her nightmares to herself. And she will not make a call on that telephone.

I was so interested to read Alison was inspired to write this book after reading about a telephone in Japan outside the town of Otsuchi. It is an old fashioned disconnected rotary dial telephone that people from all over use to call deceased loved ones.

"The image of the phone and the reason for its existence was so powerful to me that I knew, right away, I wanted to create a book inspired by it."

Thanks to the person who commented and alerted me to this picture book.  You can read more here. 

Here is the author web page

Companion books:

Love that Dog

I recognised the author's name when I spied this book in Melbourne last month. I read Snap (published in 1999) decades ago and then re-read it for this blog in 2015. I have also included covers of other books by Alison McGhee. I think Maybe a Fox covers similar themes to Telephone of the tree. Alison McGhee is also the author of the junior novel series Bink and Golly and picture books like Countdown to Kindergarten, Someday illustrated by Peter Reynolds and Always illustrated by Pascal Lemaitre.

Snap

Maybe a Fox bookseller blurb: Sylvie and Jules, Jules and Sylvie. Better than just sisters, better than best friends. Jules’ favourite thing is collecting rocks, and Sylvie’s is running – fast. But Sylvie is too fast, and when she runs to the most dangerous part of the river one snowy morning to throw in a wish rock, she is so fast that no one sees what happens when she disappears. At that very moment, in another part of the woods, a shadow fox is born: half of the spirit world, half of the animal world. She, too, is fast, and she senses danger. When Jules goes to throw one last wish rock into the river for her lost sister, the human and shadow worlds collide with unexpected consequences. Written in alternate voices – one Jules, the other the fox – this searingly beautiful tale tells of one small family’s moment of heartbreak as it unfolds into something epic, mythic, shimmering and, most of all, hopeful.