TAKING FLIGHT: Experience Displacement and Refugee Life

DIAL BOOKS, 2026

 TAKING FLIGHT is written by Kashmira Sheth and illustrated by Nicoló Carozzi. journey stories and family travel are appealing topics in picture books, and I was eager to read this one. I was also not sure what to expect. Kashmira Sheth is a writer whose work I know well, including her picture books, middle grade, and more. She brings to her work both personal and investigative backgrounds and culture that enlarge and enrich the general range of topics in children's literature. With that in mind, I expected this to be more than just a journey story, and i was not disappointed.

Using direct address to the reader (you) as if they are living the experiences, she introduces three families. One is departing a highland home with snowy peaks, another "you"  is leaving behind sprawling cotton fields and a village full of friends, while a third family is escaping their bombarded urban home. From that sudden but heartfelt opening, the three characters that embody "you" appear throughout, facing similar struggles that refugees face.

Hunger. 

Thirst.

Exhaustion,

Finding, instead of homes, makeshift tents with minimal  provisions.

Travel by plane, boat, bus... into an unknown.

Small in relation to their own adults, to the surrounding, to the great differences and worries.

NEW should be exciting, but instead requires courage for more struggles ahead, including language and insertion into a classroom or playground of strangers. 

Simple acts of kindness are revealed, activities that spark recognition and hope.

The strength of these children remains the focus of the text and illustrations. The transitions are revealed realistically but not melodramatically. The reasons behind relocation aren't addressed directly. Yet the strength of minimal text and subdued but sensitive illustrations reveal so much.

Adults who share the book with children in homes, classrooms, libraries may want to extend some geography lessons and political ones as well, offering ideas about the where and why of such changes. Children/audiences might well contribute their own awareness of such travels. 

As a story standing on its own, this is powerful and engaging, deeply moving and hopeful. 

As an example of universal experiences and needs, it is priceless.