yearning to breathe free

"The Arrival is a migrant story told as a series of wordless images that might seem to come from a long forgotten time. A man leaves his wife and child in an impoverished town, seeking better prospects in an unknown country on the other side of a vast ocean. He eventually finds himself in a bewildering city of foreign customs, peculiar animals, curious floating objects and indecipherable languages. With nothing more than a suitcase and a handful of currency, the immigrant must find a place to live, food to eat and some kind of gainful employment. He is helped along the way by sympathetic strangers, each carrying their own unspoken history: stories of struggle and survival in a world of incomprehensible violence, upheaval and hope."

I loved The Lost Thing & knew I needed to get my hands on Shaun Tan's newest book The Arrival.

It's a fantastical, abstract, surreal immigrant story. Everyone has struggled with the idea of belonging... whether it is a new school or team or job or country. At one time or another, everyone becomes a stranger in a strange land.

There is the innate desire in all of us to create a better, safer, freer life for our family. And often that requires relying on the kindness of others who have come before.


The Arrival is a beauty ... more to be looked at than read.