This is a story about God and his creation of the Universe. Cynthia Rylant has described God as an artist who is creating. As he goes through the process he dreams each new step and rests in between, very much like the book of Genesis. At the end of the story Rylant refers to people as artists as well. They are his children. The words are well crafted. The art is beautiful. However, it reminds me of another book I liked more, Draw Me a Star by Eric Carle.
The Dreamer would not be an appropriate book for school for obvious reasons. I am also inclined to think that if you are going to go so far as using the word God the text should stay more true to the words of the Bible. Having said this I am not a person who takes the Bible as a literal text. I simply mean to say that in my opinion she ventured too far from the story of Genesis to end the story by calling her artist God.
Eric Carle on the other hand gave us a very similar story without crossing that Bible/picturebook line. Although we can infer that his artist is God Eric Carle never actually uses that language. In addition I must confess that I am a huge Eric Carle fan. Something about his art is very appealing to me and I enjoy the voice he uses in his writing. I also very much like authors who do their own illustrating.
Bottom line, when faced with two such similar stories I would much prefer to share Draw Me a Star with the children in my life than The Dreamer.
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