Loquat's Way

Loquat's Way: Tales of the Step-Mule

by Tony W. Arnold
Meet Loquat — the last of his kind, and quite possibly the best listener in North America.
He's seven feet tall, has no arms, walks on two hooves, and speaks with the gentle formality of an old-world gentleman. He arrived on this continent alone, carrying nothing but a thirst for one increasingly rare thing: the sound of a child's honest laughter. What he finds along the way are the quiet, real struggles of growing up — a girl furious at being treated like a child, a boy camping alone because home isn't safe, a kid caught between two families who don't feel like one yet.
Loquat's Way collects the wandering step-mule's encounters with the children who find him hiding at the edge of the woods, behind the garden hedge, or beside a dying campfire — and who discover, one story at a time, that the strangest-looking friend can offer the most familiar kind of comfort. Equal parts fable, folklore, and quiet wisdom, each tale stands alone but adds another thread to Loquat's larger, half-mythical history — a species once bred by ancient civilizations, abandoned by the modern world, and now down to a single, gentle wanderer with nowhere left to call home but wherever a child needs him most.
Warm, whimsical, and unexpectedly moving, these stories are for anyone who ever wished for a huge, patient, otherworldly friend to appear in the garden at twilight — and tell them exactly what they needed to hear.
A found-family fable for readers young and old, where the biggest character in the room turns out to have the gentlest heart.

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