A Book of Maps for You

在搬家之前，一位年輕的製圖師為即將成為這個地方新主人的孩子留下了有關他故鄉的指引。

如果你搬到一個新地方，發現了一本專門為你準備的手繪當地指南會是怎樣的感覺呢？在《A Book of Maps for You》中，一位富有藝術天賦的年輕人正是送出了這樣的禮物。他精心製作並註解了自己家附近、學校和住所的地圖；每一個滑梯、橙樹，甚至雞舍都沒有被遺漏。

他標註了最棒的萬聖節裝飾、學校午餐的選擇，還有當地的烘焙食品、書籍或藝術用品店。他展示了樓上最適合放床的位置，就在天窗下方。就在他家的搬家卡車啟程時，另一輛卡車駛來，這本書也順利地傳遞到了下一位孩子的手中。
在一次大搬遷中，孩子可能會感受到許多壓力，迫使自己去打開心扉，接受即將到來的地方。但曾經走過無數次的街道呢？那些熟悉的面孔呢？那座他們熟悉每個水管的聲音、每個水龍頭滴水的聲音的房子呢？這些記憶也同樣值得被珍惜。

《A Book of Maps for You》讚頌了我們離開的家和我們尚未遇見的家，提醒我們它們或許只是同一枚硬幣的兩面。Lourdes Heuer的文字細膩入微，無聲地傳遞著深刻的情感，而Maxwell Eaton III的插圖充滿了豐富的細節，完美呈現了天賦異稟的孩子的作品，並保證每一頁都藏有許多驚喜，等待我們去發掘。

Before moving away, a young cartographer leaves some guidance behind about his old home for the child about to make it their new one.

What if you moved to a new place and found a hand-drawn local guidebook, left there just for you? In A Book of Maps for You, an artistic young person gives just such a gift. He’s crafted and annotated maps of his neighborhood, school, and house; no slide, orange tree, or chicken coop left uncharted.

He points out the best Halloween decorations, school lunches, and local stops for baked goods, books, or art supplies. He shows the best place to put your bed upstairs, right under the skylight. Just as his family’s moving truck pulls away, another pulls up, and sure enough, his book finds its way into the next child’s hands.

During a big move, a child can feel a lot of pressure to open their heart to the place they’re headed. But what about the roads they’ve been down hundreds of times? The faces they’ve grown up seeing? The house where they know every bang of the pipes and drip of the faucet? That history deserves care, too.

A Book of Maps for You honors the homes we leave behind and the ones we haven’t met yet, reminding us that they may just be two sides of the same coin. Lourdes Heuer’s achingly subtle text speaks volumes in all it pays attention to, and all it doesn’t have to say. Maxwell Eaton III’s signature detail-rich illustrations perfectly suggest the work of a talented child, and promise plenty of surprises to drink in and explore on each page.