Bound To Stay Bound

Other - 01/13/2025 A child grieving a move to a new apartment narrates this musing moment-by-moment story by Newbery Medalist Stead, making her picture book debut. Zhang (Emergency Quarters) works in close, spidery ballpoint lines and splashes of color to capture the child slumped before a chocolate cake that’s meant to celebrate the family’s first night in apartment 3B. "Apartments don’t have birthdays," the child says. "That’s why I put zero candles on the cake," the father smoothly replies, "Plus one, for good luck." He invites the child to make a wish, leading to an agreement of three wishes-three "Anythings." Alternating with the child’s sensory perceptions, longing remembrances of the family’s previous apartment, and "secret" wishes that can’t be met, the Anythings are granted. A rainbow appears painted on a bedroom wall, dinner includes "the biggest slice of pizza in the whole world," and Thursday bath night is abandoned. ("I have an important announcement," Daddy says. "Today is not Thursday.") That night, awakened by a passing siren, a deeper, fourth Anything emerges: "I want to go home." In the sequence that follows, this tender portrait captures a child met where they are by a parent who, with patience and humor, offers all the comfort the child needs-free of judgment or pressure. Character skin tones take the white of the page. Ages 3-5. (Apr.) - Copyright 2025

School Library Journal - 05/01/2025 K-Gr 3—Spare in words as well as art but rich in feeling, Stead's picture book captures intimate exchanges between a small child and her single dad, both white, on their new apartment's very first "birthday." Told that she can wish for three "Anythings," the young narrator first wishes for a rainbow on the wall of her room, because "Rainbow is my favorite color." Two other wishes, plus a little unpacking and a walk around the neighborhood, follow; but that first night, startled awake by a passing firetruck, she makes one extra wish: "I want to go home." Hoisting her up with a brisk "All aboard the train to home!" her dad takes her on a long journey, all around the small apartment once, and again, and then again until she drowsily asks if they're home yet. "Yes," he says. "Almost." The next morning, for a very first breakfast in the sunlit kitchen area, one last "Anything" in response to Daddy's question leads to a delicious surprise. Bursts of loosely brushed color artfully signal emotional highs and lows in the fluently drawn, fine-lined scenes of child and attentive parent, both usually in sandals or barefoot, rattling around their sparsely furnished new digs. Though the illustrator leaves lots of open space in the scenes to give the two small, lonely looks, together they do begin to seem increasingly at home. VERDICT Moving is a common experience in the lives of many children; here its ups and downs are explored with rare attention and sensitivity.—John Peters - Copyright 2025 Publishers Weekly, Library Journal and/or School Library Journal used with permission.