Choosing to banish screens from the bedroom has done wonders for my reading life. And after a summer jag reading The Chronicles of Narnia (my selected favorites), I chose to pursue more children's lit for most of my evening reads.

I think I read [b:Homecoming|12125|Homecoming (Tillerman Cycle, #1)|Cynthia Voigt|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1390250078s/12125.jpg|213788] years ago. But with the passage of time, and a more mature appreciation for a road trip tale, and childhood vis a vis abandonment, this read seemed like the first. The pages just kept turning.

The next title in the series, [b:Dicey's Song|11831|Dicey's Song (Tillerman Cycle, #2)|Cynthia Voigt|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1386923650s/11831.jpg|1968913] is on my nightstand, because I'm eager to know how each child fares in the next phase of their development. How do we survive childhood? How does anyone who faces the challenges of the Tillerman clan? What kind of adults will they be?

Almost, but not quite, unbelievable reading. ( )

This is a book in the Tillerman Cycle series. It is the first book. The books do not need to be read in order.

From Wikipedia: "In Homecoming, the four Tillerman children search for a new home after they are abandoned by their emotionally ill mother. Dicey and her younger brothers and sister eventually settle in with their grandmother ("Gram") on a stark homestead in Crisfield, Maryland on the Chesapeake Bay."

"The series does not follow a strict chronological order. Dicey's Song, A Solitary Blue, and Come a Stranger are interlocked and overlap. The Runner is a standalone novel and the events in it take place about ten years before Homecoming."

The characters are so well developed in this book, especially that of Dicey who is the responsible, older child in charge of her siblings. Abigail Tillerman, Dicey's maternal grandmother, is another marvel of Voight's writing. The perfect combination of hard and crusty with astute, reluctant kindness. Abigail fires up the third act and elevates the entire book. This is a heartfelt story with themes of love, abandonment, survival, friendship and family. Definitely worth the read. ( )

Long and improbable plot weaves brave group of four kids through city and country to find
a new home after their mother leaves them in a parking lot outside a mall. ( )

Dicey Tillerman, aged 12, and her younger siblings find themselves abandoned by their mother in a car in a mall parking lot. They were supposed to be traveling as a family from their home in Providence, RI, to their Mom's Aunt Cilla's home in Bridgeport, CT, when Mom announced that she needed to stop at a mall, and would be right back. Times had been tough with no father at home, but Aunt Cilla would surely help them out...that was the reason for the trip. When Mom did not return to the car after most of a day and a night, Dicey took matters into her own hands, and decided that going on to Bridgeport was the only option they had. With a map, very little money, and a lot of determination, she resolved to keep her brothers and sister together, and get them to Aunt Cilla's...on foot. Voigt is a marvelous storyteller, a masterful problem solver, and a genius at creating separate personalities for four remarkable little humans. If she didn't walk most of the children's route from Providence to Bridgeport herself, I'd be very surprised. As unlikely to succeed as her protagonists' endeavor seems (and it probably would not be possible in 2022, as it may have been in the late 1970s when the story is set), she made a believer out of me. One or two tiny quibbles with factual situations that I question the legitimacy of, but nothing that would swamp the entire enterprise. The ending was as good as it could be, without a scrap of sentimental BS (but I might have almost shed a little tear) I absolutely loved this book. ( )