Staff Review: "Journey" by Aaron Becker

When I first saw the spine of  "Journey" by Aaron Becker on the shelf, I thought it was perhaps a David Wiesner  or Chris Van Allsburg book. When I looked at the beautifully detailed castle on the cover I thought, "Ahhhh, David Macaulay!" Then I started looking through the book and thought, "This reminds me a bit of "Harold and the Purple Crayon!" So many allusions and influences could have turned me off to this wordless book, but Becker has taken all of these great influences and created a wonderful picture book of his own, worthy enough to share the shelves with his illustrious predecessors.

"Journey" is the story of a little girl whose family is too busy to play with her. She discovers a red crayon on the floor, draws a door on her wall, and walks through it into a magical world. She continues to have adventures, creating different vehicles that take her different places. On one adventure she rescues an exotic purple bird that leads her to a small purple door in a tree. When she crawls through after the bird, the girl discovers that she's not so alone after all. 

With no words to get in the way, this story is an adventure in the power of imagination. It also reminds us that friends can be right around the corner. And if this is what the inside of Aaron Becker's brain looks like, I want to live there! I recommend this book for adventurers of all ages.

--Andrea W., H.Q.

P.S. I mean, seriously, don't you want to go here? Click below to watch the book trailer. If it doesn't give you goosebumps, I don't know what will.