A JOURNEY TOWARD HOPE

978-1644420089 (English Edition)
978-1644420270 (Spanish Edition)
Publication Date: August 4, 2020
$19.95 | Hardcover w/ dust jacket

40 pages
Fully illustrated throughout
11” x 8.5” (HxW)

Four unaccompanied migrant children come together along the arduous journey north through Mexico to the United States border in this ode to the power of hope and connection even in the face of uncertainty and fear.

SUMMARY

Every year, roughly 50,000 unaccompanied minors arrive at the US/Mexico border to present themselves for asylum or related visas. The majority of these children are non-Mexicans fleeing the systemic violence of Central America’s “Northern Triangle”: Honduras, El Salvador, and Guatemala. A Journey Toward Hope tells the story of Rodrigo, a 14-year-old escaping Honduran violence; Alessandra, a 10-year-old Guatemalan whose first language is Q’eqchi’; and the Salvadoran siblings Laura and Nando. Though their reasons for making the journey are different and the journey northward is perilous, the four children band together, finding strength in one another as they share the dreams of their past and the hopes for their future. Written in collaboration with Baylor University’s Global Hunger and Migration Project, A Journey Toward Hope is a celebration of their humanity and an ode to the power of hope and connection even in the face of uncertainty and fear.

CONTRIBUTOR BIOS

Victor Hinojosa, Ph.D., is Associate Professor of Political Science in the Honors Program at Baylor University where his primary research is in Latin American Politics and U.S.-Latin American relations. His articles have appeared in scholarly books and journals including Terrorism and Political Violence, Political Science Quarterly, the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, and the Mennonite Quarterly Review.

Dr. Hinojosa currently directs the Global Hunger and Migration Project, a social innovation laboratory at Baylor University that is bringing together an interdisciplinary team of faculty and students to address the challenges of child migration from Mexico and the Northern Triangle of Central America (Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador). In collaboration with the Texas Hunger Initiative, Mennonite Central Committee, and others Dr. Hinojosa and his students are working to design interventions into this challenging humanitarian crisis.

Coert Voorhees is the author the novels ON THE FREE (2017), IN TOO DEEP (2013 Junior Library Guild Selection), LUCKY FOOLS (2012 Junior Library Guild Selection), and THE BROTHERS TORRES (2009 ALA Top Ten Best Books for Young Adults), as well as the picture book STORM WRANGLER (2012). He has been a Fulbright scholar in Chile and Visiting Writer in Residence at Rice University, and he now lives with his family in Houston, Texas. Visit Coert’s website at www.coertvoorhees.com.

Susan Guevara is a visual storyteller. She tells her tales with illustrations, paintings, drawings, and sculptures. For 27 years, her work as a children’s picture book illustrator has been recognized for its contribution to literature set in Latino culture. Her work has been included in the 2005 New York Times Ten Best Illustrated Books of the Year, won two Pura Belpré Illustrator Awards and the inaugural Tomás Rivera Award, and most recently, a Pura Belpré Honor Award for her book Little Roja Riding Hood (written by Susan Middleton Elya). Her book Chato’s Kitchen (written by Gary Soto) was recognized as one of the Best 100 Books of the Last 100 Years by the New York Public Library. She lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

PRAISE

“An emotional entry point to a larger, necessary discussion on this complex and difficult subject." — Kirkus Reviews

“A must read.” — Mrs. Book Dragon

“A heart-breaking & hopeful glimpse into immigration that will be useful to start important conversations.” — Lisa Maucione, Literary Specialist