The olive tree lives on a grassy slope in the Galilee. Since it first sprouted from a pit, it has been touched by people, and provides them with precious oil, fruit, wood, medicine, shade -- and even a place to hide secrets. Since the beginning of civilization, these ancient, shapely trees have shaped history itself. With a lifespan of two thousand years or more, an olive tree may be tended by generations of the same family. This book explores the life of one such tree through twenty centuries of upheaval and change, and the people who inhabit its world -- and find peace in the shade of the olive tree.

D. Yael Bernhard is the illustrator of three-dozen children's books and the author of nine -- including fiction and non-fiction, natural science titles, and multicultural folktales.