Home: A Librarian’s Perspective Review

Publisher’s Summary

Home is a tired lullaby
and a late-night traffic that mumbles in
through a crack in your curtains.

Home is the faint trumpet of a distant barge
as your grandfather casts his line
from the edge of his houseboat.

So begins this stirring celebration of home in its many forms. For home is an idea more profound than the walls we build up around ourselves. It’s the family that shows its love through small gestures every day. It’s the community that sees one another through hard times. And it’s the wonder of the natural world, a refuge we share with every living thing on Earth.

With lyrical text and expressive artwork, Matt de la Peña and Loren Long’s meditation on the universal pull of home, whatever its form, is destined to become a new classic that will be cherished by readers of every age.

Awards and Kudos

• Publishers Weekly starred
• SLJ starred
• Booklist starred

My Review of Home

This gorgeous picture book is the latest from a powerhouse author-illustrator duo.

Author Matt de la Peña won the 2016 Newbery Award for The Last Stop on Market Street (2015). Illustrator Christian Robinson also won the Caldecott Award for this book in the same year.

The illustrator, Loren Long, created the illustrations for The Yellow Bus (2024), which I predicted would win the 2025 Caldecott. It did not win, but I think this book will yet again be a Caldecott contender for 2026. Other notable titles illustrated by Loren Long include: Love (with author Matt de la Peña), Change Sings (with author Amanda Gorman), and Someone Builds the Dream (with author Lisa Wheeler).

The rich vocabulary is full of sensory details to savor. Some examples:

• “the gnarled branches of an old oak tree”
• “the calloused hand of a quiet father”
• “the hawk steadily circling overhead, measuring the sky with its wings”

Home is a great choice if you are teaching second person narration, which is used throughout the story. Various diverse children and families are featured in the illustrations, but the story addresses “you” as the main character.

This is not always a happy story. Characters are devastated by homes lost in a flood or what appears to be eviction. But the crux of the story is that though disasters may occur, home is not necessarily a place. Home is where your family is. I love that this also includes dogs!

This might be a great picture book to share with families that have suffered the tragic loss of their home to disasters such as fire or floods or moving away. Some of the illustrations are sad, but readers are reassured after the loss of the homes because home is where your family is.

Throughout the story, families triumph together, and noticing the small details of everyday life helps us get through hard times.

Notable Illustrations and Discussion Topics

• very close airplane outside a window – The text describes the “rumble through the floorboads” as the plane goes by

• busy family with a construction scene outside – Notice the strong muscles on the female construction worker! Also, the father is feeding the baby (who appears to be refusing the food), mom is rushing off to work, and older sibling is alone on the porch

• devastated faces of the parents in the truck – They are moving away from their house. This might be a good discussion page for students. Why are they moving? Why are they so sad? Why are they holding hands? Why are their belongings on the curb (and being left behind)?

• What are some of the activities that help the families feel less sad? (cooking, tossing a baseball, reading, walking together and holding hands, attending church, climbing a tree, enjoying nature)

• 2-page spread of child’s face up-close – Notice the earth reflected in the child’s eyes!

Diversity

Home features many different and diverse characters. Families include mothers, fathers, grandparents, and children. Skin tones vary. One adult female wears hijab, and a young male character is wearing a yarmulke. Queer families are not explicitly represented, but some pages feature numerous characters that may or may not be queer.

Librarians Will Want to Know

• Would adults like this book? YES; the language is gorgeous, and the illustrations include lots of details to pore over.

• Would I buy this for my high school library? YES, IF… I were looking for examples of imagery in picture books for ELA classes.

• Would I buy this for my middle school library? YES, IF… I were looking for examples of imagery in picture books for ELA classes.

• Would I buy this for my elementary library? ABSOLUTELY YES! I think this could be a Caldecott contender for next year, but even if it isn’t, the illustrations and message of hope during natural disasters are excellent.

Mature Content

• Profanity: none

• Sexuality: none

• Violence: none

• Drugs/Alcohol: one character silhouette on a city street MIGHT have a cigarette in his mouth. It could easily be a straw or toothpick as it is a silhouette.

• Other: Some illustrations are sad. Parents moving away from their home have devastation on their faces. A family is in a boat escaping a flash flood. A dog is in flood waters and swimming toward a boat. But the message is of hope in the face of disaster.

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