The Ship in the Window is written by Travis Jonker, author of 100 Scope Notes a School Library Journal blog, and illustrated by Caldecott Medalist Matthew Cordell. This book gorgeously tells the story of a three character, a man, a child and a mouse and how although they are three separate strands, they are connected, just like a roped, twisted together and much stronger that way. The man creating a beloved model ship, covets his model and puts such care in it. He clearly wants the child to also love the ship, but isn’t ready to have the child help with the special project. Any grown up can relate to this as you work so hard on something and want your child to love it as well, but don’t feel like they are ready to partake in creating it to your standard yet. The mouse watches it all from a distance. And then, one night, the mouse dares to take the ship out to sea. The mouse, now the captain of the ship, sails until dawn when he is discovered by and angry man and shocked child. Slowly joy takes over both the man and the child as they see the ship doing what it is meant to do. Until….tragedy! The story comes to a magnificent and compassionate ending and you discover this book is really about how we react in hard situations, its how we move forward that matters the most. And this man, child, and mouse, choose to move forward together. Finally seeing that there is love and power in connection and creating things, like the ship, together.

This book is important to both grown ups and children! The illustrations add to the simple, yet strong text and make it even more profound. Every time you flip through the story you will find something else to look at in the drawings. Every person should at least read it twice.

I highly recommend this beautiful book and think it belongs in every school.