The Return

by Natalia Chernysheva

Coming home from her independent city life, a young woman rediscovers childlike wonder and comfort at her grandmother’s house. A young woman gets on the bus and rides out of the big city. She arrives in the countryside, where she is as big as a giant, looming over a tiny house, a garden and her tiny grandmother. The cabbages and the apple trees are far below. Her grandmother smiles up at her in her yellow hat. The young woman bends down to give her little grandmother a big kiss, and then she smells her grandmother’s cooking. She has returned home. When they sit down at the table, the young woman has shrunk to a child-like size, and the two share a meal together in the garden. In this gentle, wordless story Natalia Chernysheva beautifully captures the feelings of coming home to comfort and memories and of returning to our childlike selves. Correlates to the Common Core State Standards in English Language CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.1.7
Use illustrations and details in a story to describe its characters, setting, or events.

Genres: Picture Books, Family, Childrens, International

36 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2014

Reviews

[Toni · Rating 5 out of 5]

My grandfather was a fantastic cook. Whenever my mum was there to visit him and we sat down for a meal, she had this unforgettable expression on her face: pure bliss. I remember trying to understand their complex relationship of a father and a grown-up daughter with her own adult responsibilities. She told me that you are always a child as long as one of your parents is alive and only now I am beginning to understand her words.




Thank you to Edelweiss and Ingram Publisher Services for the ARC provided in return for an honest opinion.

[Gabriel Infierno · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thank you edelweiss+ for the DRC

This is such a beautiful book, I'm crying in I really miss my grandma, so sutil and truthfull, I really love thank you for this book.

[Alyssa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Simple, moving illustrations that convey dirt and nature and homes in a beautiful way. Magical-realist story about going home to loved ones. Wordless, apart from some signs kept in the original Russian.

[Alice Ball · Rating 4 out of 5]

The experience of returning to your childhood home as a grown person depicted memorably without words.

[Anabela De Sousa Azevedo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Lindo!

[Mary Lee · Rating 4 out of 5]

A wordless picture book that explores the shift in perspective that happens when, as a grownup, we return to our childhood home.

[Nikki · Rating 5 out of 5]

Written and illustrated by the author, The Return is one of the United States Board on Books for Young People’s (USBBY) Outstanding International Books List for 2020. This wordless picture book for young readers aged 3-7 is based on Le Retour, the animated short film produced by Natalia Chernysheva of Russia. Chernysheva uses simple black-line drawings with highlights of red and yellow bursts of color to tell the tale of a young woman who travels from the city to a small house in the remote countryside. It is at this house that the reader sees whom we presume to be the young woman’s grandmother, diminutive in stature compared to her granddaughter towering over her and the house and garden. Despite their difference in size, there is a powerful shared warmth between the two women as the grandmother hugs her granddaughter’s ankle before the young woman leans down to remove her grandmother’s floppy yellow garden hat and kiss her face. As the older woman stirs a mug of soup on the table, her granddaughter inhales the savory aroma and she is immediately taken back in time to memories of when she was a little girl sharing quality time and home-cooked meals with her beloved grandmother. I would imagine there are a variety of ways to interpret this story, but I got the sense that the young woman was now independent and successful with her new life in the city. I perceived that she probably had that larger-than-life persona to her grandmother who watched her grow up and how she views herself as she returns to this home and her childhood. The simple illustrations allow the reader to appreciate the book’s theme of how reminders of the past often appear smaller in our mind’s eye, but sensory experiences can instantly transport us back to that time and place when we were very young. However, throughout the passage of time, the immense love for those we cherish remains the same. I thought this was a beautiful book that would be a wonderful story to share with a very young child who can invent and reinvent the story with continued retellings.

[Jason · Rating 2 out of 5]

Okay, before anyone gets mad, the two star rating is for this book as a picture book (as it is apparently being marketed as such). This is so far above any child's ability to relate to, I can't understand why anyone even thought it had potential as a children's book. This is a story for adults, period. NOW, as a story for adults, it is incredible the way Chernysheva communicates so much in the images--what she chooses to illustrate and how. I love how the woman looms large in the beginning--how many of us have felt that way coming home again? How small things seems, how much we've outgrown in many ways what home used to represent. But then again, we discover that (for those of us who were fortunate to have positive home experiences) there is always a part of us that remains just the right size for home.

[João Teixeira · Rating 5 out of 5]

Este livro não tem palavras... Mas para que servem as palavras quando não são necessárias? A autora consegue transmitir a sua mensagem de forma brilhante através das suas ilustrações e, para mim, isso é magnífico.
A protagonista da história volta a casa da avó, já crescida, para relembrar que um dia foi pequenina... E que ainda é, aos olhos da avó querida.

[Jessica (Spooky KidLit & We Who Walk Here, Walk Alone) · Rating 5 out of 5]

Don't read the synopsis; you don't need it. With illustrations that are joyfully expressive and deceptively simple, Natalia Chernysheva proves Thomas Wolfe wrong and shows that you can indeed go home again. In just a few wordless pages, she captures the complex emotions of revisiting the places of your childhood and the pleasures of being transported back in time by the smell of your grandmother's cooking. Adults will feel the truth of this book in their souls, and children will find comfort in the fact that no matter how big they get, they will still be able to return to this feeling of being cherished by their loved ones.

My thanks to Groundwood Books and Edelweiss+ for providing an advance copy in exchange for an honest review.

[Erendira · Rating 5 out of 5]

At once she's regular and upon approaching her old home, she is larger than life. But when she is served in the comforts of her dining table from her childhood, she is at once little in the arms of her mother. What a beautiful metaphor on our seasons in life: when we leave where we grew up and return home, we think we are so much better off, but then we are humbled by what is pure and wholesome, what is familiar and at least, comforting.

[Zhiyuan · Rating 5 out of 5]

The best graphic books are those that tell stories without words. The Return is one among them. Simple and short, yet psychologically powerful and emotionally potent. It brings me back to my childhood with Grandma while "reading" it to my son. I told him that one day when you grow up and come back from College far away, I will see you as a giant, and when you sit down at the table with me, you are my little kiddo, always.

[Erin]

If you were ever looking for a book that perfectly captures the feeling of coming home, this is it.

Another contender as a replacement for Oh, the Places You'll Go! as a gift.

[Mariana Rizzo · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is saddening in my eyes. The main character herself is far from normal. I would say she is unique for her size. Her own grandmother has to smile up at her. I think this book teaches children that despite what they may look like, they are expected and loved. Her grandmother loves her despite how tall she is. Everyone in society should be treated this fair.

[SaraKat · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a wordless picture book that does not seem to be for children. I enjoyed it, but it has themes of coming home to parents after being gone a while and grown up and coming back for a visit. The childhood home seems small and a whiff of mom's soup makes you feel like a kid again. These are things that normal picture book audiences can't relate to, but their parents can.

[Ingrid ♡ · Rating 5 out of 5]

La idea se expone con claridad.
Aquel que llamamos hogar y se siente como uno, siempre ofrecerá una bienvenida calida y una tarde acogedora.
Entender esta pequeña historia me hizo pensar en cómo es suficiente el regresar al hogar, encontrar a mamá y comer un gran tazón de su sopa. Muchas veces solo basta con eso para nadar en la esperanza de que todo estará bien porque aún alguien cuida de ti.

[Molly · Rating 5 out of 5]

In this wordless picture book, a woman goes to visit her grandmother and is transported back to her childhood. This is a beautiful picture book about love, the joys of childhood and the comforts of home.

[Andréa]

Note: I accessed a digital review copy of this book through Edelweiss.

[Miss Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

An adult return to a relaticves house which seems small now but holds great memories. Preschool and up

[Ashley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sweet wordless picture book about returning home and feeling very grown up until you revert to your child self at the taste of grandma's homemade soup.

[Calli Leventis · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wordless

[N · Rating 5 out of 5]

Simple. Wordless. But truly evocative.

[BAM · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautiful!

[Dee Dee G · Rating 5 out of 5]

Super short with no words. No words needed. The pictures told it all. Very cute illustrations as well.

[Todd]

Very dear wordless book about feeling so big upon returning home -- and then finding a way to be "little" again.