cover image How the Gods Created the Finger People: A Mayan Fable

How the Gods Created the Finger People: A Mayan Fable

Elizabeth Moore and Alice Couvillon, illus. by Luz-Maria Lopez, Pelican, $18.99 (32p) ISBN 978-1-58980-889-8

In this bilingual collaboration, Honduran artist Lopez interprets a Mayan human origins story. When the lonely gods decide to make humans, it's a case of trial and error: a clay man melts in water, a man fashioned from wood burns, and a gold man is indifferent to Earth's beauty. Finally, the "Good-Hearted God" cuts off his fingers ("He knew his fingers... would grow back like lizards' tails") and creates the childlike finger people, who take pity on the gold man, causing the gods to decide that "descendants of the gold man will be rich," and descendants of finger people poor. Though the message is likely to puzzle readers, Lopez's paintings, merging Mayan motifs with abstract sculptural elements, show a forcefulness reminiscent of Frida Kahlo's works. Ages 5–8. (Apr.)