Today one of our favourite picture book authors, Clare Helen Welsh, is starting a new book initiative called Books That Help.
Like many bookstagrammers and book bloggers, authors and illustrators Clare is passionate about picture books and how they can help readers of all ages deal with complex emotions, difficult situations and life changes.
When I was training to be a teacher, my dissertation for my degree focused on using picture books with older readers.
Since then I have collected illustrated children’s books that I believe are important for all readers from birth to death and through all the journeys of their life.
Whenever something happens that I find difficult to process, hard to explain and almost impossible to share with my children, I turn to picture books.
When Baby Tilda died I started to collect books around loss and grief, around death and learning to live after loss.
You can find the books that have helped us by searching #edspirereadslossandgrief and #edspirereadsgriefandloss on Instagram
You can also look at the Guides that I have curated there and that I am continually adding to
Linked to the loss of Tilda, I also collect and share books about mental health and feelings.
Over the last decade the quality and content of picture books has come a long way. Our children are so lucky to have so many books to help them understand themselves and others, to show them what life is like for children and grown ups around the world, to help them tell their own stories when they cannot find the words themselves.
This new initiative from Clare Helen Welsh is going to help a lot of people and you can join Clare and share the books that help you and books that you believe can and will help or have helped others.
Each day this week Clare Helen Welsh is sharing her #BooksThatHelp with different topics.
Today is Serious Illnesses and the children and I have chosen to share five books that have helped us as a family talk about dementia and the importance of memories. Our collection includes one of Clare’s own books, The Tide, illustrated by Ashling Lindsay.
Before I share our thoughts on our chosen books, do have a look at Clare Helen Welsh’s website and her Books That Help initiative.
If you are looking for picture books that offer support through life’s ups and downs, covering subjects that include family separations, illness, grief, anxiety, well-being, moving house and more, you will find them here. Clare’s Books That Help is also an opportunity to celebrate a carefully curated list of outstanding picture books and the teams behind them.
Books That Help Families To Talk About Dementia
The Tide by Clare Helen Welsh and Ashling Lindsay
This is a new to us book and my goodness it is a beauty. The artwork is stunning. Edie and I love the seaside scenes, they always make us talk about our favourite beach days and waiting for the tide to come and wash over our sandcastles. This is a very special sea story showing the deep love and strong bond between a little girl and her grandad. Clare has such a wonderful way of adding gentle humour to serious subjects and making them easier for a child to accept and begin to understand. In this story Grandad does not remember things like he used to, he gets into a muddle and needs more help than before. The little girl adores her grandad and she loves the times that they spend together. The little girl is telling us her story and likening Grandad’s forgetting to things that she sometimes forgets too. We hear the little girl’s voice and see her thoughts, we follow her journey of processing what is happening to her grandad and beginning to understand. There is heartbreak and joy in the pages of this book and the metaphor of the tide coming in and going out is stunning and incredibly moving. This book will help children and their grown ups talk about memory loss and dementia and find ways to make the most of the times when the tide is in. Full review and supporting art activities for this brilliant and beautiful book coming soon.
The Forgettery by Rachel Ip and Laura Hughes
This is a brilliant and beautiful book that captured my heart and the hearts of all my children as we read about Amelia and her Granny and talked about all our favourite memories, the things we hope never to forget. What a magical place The Forgettery is and what a truly special way to talk to children about the importance of memories, memory loss and what it means to have dementia. This is a magical adventure story gently touching on the experience of memory loss and helping children talk to their grown ups about dementia and alzheimers. I will be sharing a full review of this book and some of the work that we have been doing around our reading of this beautiful tale so tenderly told. A story to treasure.
Through The Forest by Yijing Li
This is a story about the importance of memories, good ones and bad. A tale that tells how our memories shape us and make us who we are. How memories forge the paths we follow. This is a story of the part our memories play in the winding journey of our life. This story shows how our memories can weigh us down, can lift us up, can show us the way forward and remind us of joys and sorrows past. It is a story that shows how our memories can affect our mental health. A full review of this book along with some activities we have done around this brilliant and beautiful book is coming soon.
The Long Way Home by Corrinne Averiss and Kristyna Litten
This is a wonderful story about the love between a grandma and grandson. Nanu and Otto love adventures and they love exploring together. In this story the pair are off on a climbing adventure – to the top of Lion Mountain. Nanu and Otto are brave and bold explorers and they are excited to be heading off together.
As they start out on their journey it becomes clear to Otto that Nanu is having a forgetting day. Otto must remember all the things that Nanu has taught him to get them safely home. The children and I loved this beautifully illustrated story and we talked a lot about making the most of everyday and making memories with the ones we love. We talked a lot about having empathy for others and what it means to be sensitive in our handling of others. We talked about memories and losing memory and forgetting days. This is a truly lovely story written with a gentle tender heart and a reminder to us all to care for our families and to look out for and after one another. It really made us miss our Granny and Nanny too. Otto and Nanu are wonderful characters, brave and funny. We liked them both a lot. Corinne Averiss writes that this book is “for days remembered in the heart, if not in the head” which meant I was crying before the story was even begun.
If you are a doubter of the power and quality of early reader books for young readers you need to read all about Nanu and Otto and The Long Way Home.
Who Let The Gods Out by Maz Evans
William loves this series of books. They are wickedly funny and full of adventure but there is also a serious side to these brilliant and beautiful books. Maz Evan’s writes beautifully about dementia and child carers. Elliot Hooper, the main character in the series, is constantly in trouble at school, but he can’t reach out for help because nobody knows his secret. His mother is very sick. She has dementia. Elliot is doing his best to look after her while not telling anyone about her illness. Elliot is scared that his mother will be taken away from him, that they will be separated from one another. Elliot’s mum is all he has. Elliot’s troubles are made worse when he has to take out a loan using his mother’s name, he has only a few days to pay it back or he and his mum will be out on the street. Elliot makes a wish and The Gods answer, sort of, kind of in a more hindrance than help kind of way! You will have to read the books for yourself to see what happens.