My Home Is in My Backpack

A family’s forced migration prompts a new way of seeing home in this sensitively rendered tale of change from Perrella and Salerno. High on a hill at night, young narrator Clara sits with Papá, Mamá, brother Pedro, and dog Coco, watching for shooting stars. When the children’s parents explain that the family is leaving the next day, Clara isn’t surprised—relatives and acquaintances have already gone, and “I knew that one day we would, too.” At dawn, the family joins a long queue of people walking with bedrolls and backpacks (“I carry Coco... and I tell her that I will always look after her”). During a journey that involves “a hiding game” and transport by boat, Papá asks, “Do you know that our home is always with us?... it is made from the people we love and the things we love doing.” As Clara becomes aware of the home that is “here right now” (“family, Coco, drawing, and thinking about my best memories”), the child asks others about what they love. Via a restrained palette of blues, golds, and greens, arresting graphite and digital illustrations communicate the passage of time (initially clean-shaven Papá’s face fills in with a beard), while visually emphasizing, through thin, etching-like lines that overlay the book’s scenes, “the invisible things” the travelers “carry in their hearts.” A note concludes. Characters are portrayed with various skin tones. Ages 4–7. (Oct.)