Bark and Tim: a true story of friendship based on the paintings of Tim Brown.

By Audrey Glassman Vernick and Ellen Glassman Gidaro. Hardcover, $14.95. The Overmountain Press, 800/992-2691, www.overmountainpress.com.

Mississippi folk artist Tim Brown served as the inspiration for this children's book, written by sisters Audrey Glassman Vernick and Ellen Glassman Gidaro. Brown, who first began experimenting with housepaints as art media as a child in Mississippi, said he began painting pictures of his childhood as a way to capture his memories, since his family had no photographs of when he was young. Bark, the subject of much of that work, was a dog Brown received for Christmas one year.

As his paintings began to find an audience, the Glassman sisters discovered one of his pictures, "Feeding Bark," on the auction website eBay. The more they studied it, the more they were intrigued by Brown's childhood. After contacting his agent, the pair interviewed the reclusive Brown by letter and fleshed out the book from there.

Bark and Tim is a story about how Bark carne to live at Tim's house, illustrated by 15 pictures of Tim, his family, and their animals, which include Bark and a family cat, whom Bark loves to chase. The childlike lines of the pictures and the simple titles such as "Baby Bark," "My Present Bark," and "Washing Bark" give the cook a wonderful look, as if the illustrator was still a child experimenting with brushes and colors. "Bark Died" is especially affecting, with a kneeling Tim seeming to wave goodbye to Bark as he flies upward to meet an angel with outstretched wings.

At the end of the book are short essays about Brown, the Glassman sisters, and the book's origin, as well as a page directing readers to more resources on Brown's folk art tradition. But the fun of the book is the truth in Brown's dedication on the front pages: "For all my long-ago friends in the South, many of whom are dead and gone. And for those who like the stories they see in my paintings."