Still a Family
A Story about Homelessness
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- $9.99
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- $9.99
Publisher Description
New York Public Library Best Books for Kids 2017
A family has fallen on hard times and are living in different homeless shelters. But even though they are separate, they are still a family.
A little girl and her parents have lost their home and must live in a homeless shelter. Even worse, due to a common shelter policy, her dad must live in a men's shelter, separated from her and her mom. Despite these circumstances, the family still finds time to be together. They meet at the park to play hide-and-seek, slide on slides, and pet puppies. While the young girl wishes for better days when her family is together again under a roof of their very own, she continues to remind herself that they're still a family even in times of separation.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
A girl with brown braids keeps her chin up while living in a shelter with her mother. "My dad lives in a different shelter, down another street," she explains, adding (in what becomes the book's refrain), "But we are still a family." Sturgis (The Lake Where Loon Lives) doesn't ignore the girl's desires for stability and a permanent home ("I miss my quiet room, my comfy bed, and my cozy quilt") but shows how the family members support each other, exchanging modest gifts, waiting together in long soup kitchen lines, and celebrating the girl's birthday with a cupcake and a wish. Lee, in her U.S. debut, uses a mix of media to create rough, childlike scenes that givethe sense that the girl is both telling and illustrating her story. With an estimated 2.5 million children homeless in the U.S., this is an empathic and valuable book, both for families without a home and for those in a position to help; an author's note and list of resources offers suggestions for how readers can do just that. Ages 4 8.
