The Music of Life

Lenny is a music composer living in the heart of Paris. One night, he sits down to begin a symphony but remains stumped for hour after hour until, noticing the sound of his cat Pipo lapping milk from a bowl, he is inspired to search for the symphony around him. Repeating the phrase “It’s not a symphony, but it feels like music,” Lenny draws inspiration first from the sounds inside his apartment (like a leaking sink), then from the sounds of the the great outdoors, both man-made and natural (like a jogger running, squirrels cracking nuts, and the squeaky wheels of a trolley), until he exclaims, “Now this feels like a symphony!” Created in ink and watercolor and featuring iconic Parisian elements and architecture, the illustrations’ blend of reality and style mirror the book’s message about finding and creating art from everyday moments in a blend of color and experience. Thomas’s depiction of Lenny’s facial expressions is skillfully nuanced, particularly in showing the familiar look of an artist straining to capture a fleeting, inspiring moment. Pulling together the scattered notes hastily scrawled by Lenny to capture each sound that inspires him, the story culminates in a full page of sheet music—composed by Thomas’s Aunt Anne—that gives readers a sense of the true magnitude of what Lenny has accomplished.