Daddy, Will You Miss Me?

It is rare to come across a picture book featuring a strong boy/father emotional story-line. ‘My Daddy’s going to work, far away in Africa – without me’ is an opening that at once draws in the infant reader and adult alike. Both father and son mark their time apart in different ways. Each day the son puts a big red X on the calendar in the kitchen; the father whispers his son’s name to the wind so that it swirls home across continents. While Dad encounters heat, dust and giant African birds and lions, the son looks out on snow and drinks hot chocolate. There is a gentle pace and simplicity to the narrative which conveys their sense of separation with power and pathos, so that their reuniting at the airport on the final page brought tears to the four-year-old with whom I read.

Eachus’ soft-focus illustrations offer a stunning backdrop to the text: from her pictures of the boy alone with his thoughts of distant Africa to the final page of father and son embracing. This is a book that handsomely embodies ‘the cuddle factor’ of fine picture books and one which every dad and lad in the land should share!