The Road Home by Katie Cotton illustrated by Sarah Jacoby

"For safety is a precious place, a place to call our own. This road is hard, this road is long, this road that leads us home."

Reviewers have described this book as poetic, sober, dark, elegant, spare, meditative and beautiful.  

As I read this book I pondered... 

Was the text of this book actually a famous poem? One that I should perhaps already know? Was the text of this book a song? A gentle ballad sung long ago?

None of these things are true. Katie Cotton has penned an original and beautiful poem about nature and the need to feel safe. As for music - while there is no music written for these words - I think someone should transform this text into a gentle song.

"Fly with me to far away, where sun still warms the ground. For winter's in the daytime light and in that windswept sound."

You can see many of the pages and illustrations from this book on this blog post by Books and Umbrellas.

Here is the publisher blurb: As winter approaches, a bird flees with her chick, a mouse builds a nest for her child and rabbits run from wolves that roam in the darkening woods. The road home is long and hard, but the animals have each other in this poetic meditation on nature, survival and love. 

Katie Cotton is a UK author and Sarah Jacoby lives in Philadelphia.

Now take a look at the two cover images above. Which one do you like? The UK edition (second image) actually has gold embossed lettering.

The struggle to survive and find a home in nature is told in verse. For those who don't appreciate children’s books that sugarcoat the harsh truths of survival in the wild, there's this spare and beautiful book in which a bird, a rabbit, a mouse, and a wolf travel with their respective offspring, trying to find a home … Kirkus Star

Katie Cotton and Sarah Jacoby's glorious "The Road Home" has the sort of inner voice that feels like a drop of honey on the end of the tongue, or the brush of a feather on your bare foot. Read it Again Daddy

Delicate water colours suffused with light, are fused against soft layers of landscape. Birds fly south, shrews build nests, rabbits scamper and wolves howl as harsh winter approaches. Books for Keeps

Katie Cotton is the author of 24 books including Dear Bunny.