NOTE: This is the 8X10 Large Format Edition. Based on a top-selling series of folk art paintings in the early 2000s, "The Shadow-Dogs Journeys" fills in the gaps depicted by those miniature works of art as well as the accompanying pieces in other media they inspired. Like a Native American "Pilgrim's Progress," "Shadow-Dogs" takes its readers on a quest that is old yet new, battling monsters and making mystical friends in lands where gourds miraculously become boats, nut-hulls become emergency dwellings and building-sized idols threaten the lives of the seven intrepid travelers who, themselves from vastly differing tribes, must find a way to reunite warring Nations of their long-separated peoples. In the company of not only the Shadow-Dogs but Dogs of Sun, Frost and Salt, they are led by the Shadow-Crow, who like the Dogs has been raised up from a creature and substance despised to guide and protect his charges, as have the giant animals who also join them. On this first leg of their journey, the seven are brought from the sacred Four Directions to meet in a mystical campsite where they will prepare for an adventure both rugged and terrifying...but threaded throughout with great beauty, as well.