Note: I received a signed hardcover copy from the publisher at ALA Midwinter 2020. ( )

Poignant and lovely tale of the ways in which we carry our homes and our stories with us moment to moment and place to place. ( )

When a little girl and her younger brother are forced along with their family to flee the home they've always known, they must learn to make a new home for themselves -- wherever they are. And sometimes the smallest things -- a cup, a blanket, a lamp, a flower, a story -- can become a port of hope in a terrible storm. As the refugees travel onward toward an uncertain future, they are buoyed up by their hopes, dreams and the stories they tell -- a story that will carry them perpetually forward.

This is a beautiful story about hope and survival. ( )

I found this book very imaginative even by looking at the cover you can see how the children in the story used their imagination to express their experiences while traveling. I loved how they saw the boat as being a teacup.

https://www.npr.org/2020/08/31/905804301/welcome-to-story-hour-100-favorite-book.....

"Here" changes as a young girl travels with her family and others, carrying their possessions, which, in a way, become their home: the cup out of which they sip warm drinks, the blanket under which they snuggle, the lamp that lights the night. The narrator draws and illustrates their journey in a homemade book as they go.

"And this cup is a home...
And this blanket is a sail...
And this lamp is a lighthouse...
And this flower is a ladder...
And this story is a boat."

"Artwork created with colored pencil and watercolor, oil and acrylic paint on painted paper, with additional natural materials including wood, wool and cut paper."

See also: Teacup by Rebecca Young, Dreamers by Yuyi Morales ( )