Today it is my turn on the A Swift Return book tour. My stop on the tour takes the form of a book review.

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Title: A Swift Return

Written by: Fiona Barker

Illustrated by: Howard Gray

Published by: Tiny Tree

Blurb

Aria has her head in the clouds. Yusuf keeps his feet on the ground. But when they work together to save a bird who has lost her way, something magical happens. When Swift loses her way on her epic migration. Aria and Yusuf come to her rescue and are inspired to think big about looking after the sky above their city. Inspired by Fiona and Howard’s love for wildlife of all kinds, A Swift Return is the follow-up to Setsuko and the Song of the Sea. Howard’s beautiful illustrations evoke a strong sense of place, strengthened by the beautiful Arabic text distilled by Maysoon AbuBlan.

Blurb for A Swift Return

My Review

A Swift Return is a sweet and educational picture book written from the points of view of two children – Aria and Yusuf. They are both very different from each other. Yesuf is practical and good at making things. Aria is a dreamer with some great ideas. Together they help a swift who fell out of the sky due to the pollution it encounters on its migration route over the city back from the South.

Aria and Yusef become good friends. They care for the swift until it is strong enough to fly and set up cleaning their city together in small ways. For example by making flower boxes and walking to school every day. The book demonstrates how everyone can help to prevent pollution as even small changes can make a difference.  

A Swift Return was published in February 2024. The Arabic text is unique and I remember back in the 1990’s desperately looking for duel text books like this for the bilingual children and refugees in my class and there were not enough of them. Hopefully, this book will be the start of a new trend. However, in some places I felt the Arabic text blended too much into the background which may make it difficult for early readers to read and they will be dependant on an adult reading it to them.

The text worked well in unison with the beautiful illustrations. They were full of movement and emotion. I enjoyed the way the illustrations provided subtext and became important to telling the story themselves.

Great book for young children who are starting to read independently, with an important environmental message we can all relate to.

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About the Author

Fiona is a middle-aged, married mum of one. She is positively potty about picturebooks; reading them and writing them. When writing, she longs for alliterative loveliness but is reluctant to rhyme. When reading, she looks for a marriage of words and artwork and loves anything that is fun to read aloud.

Fiona loves doing school author visits and speaking to adults about picture books and children’s publishing.

I would like to thank The Write Reads for inviting me to take part in this book tour. Thank you.

To read my interview with Fiona Barker about her road to publication take a look at: An interview with… Fiona Barker

To find out more about Fiona Barker and her books you can follow her @Fi_BGB on twitter, @FionaWritesBooks on Facebook and Instagram and her author website is: www.fionabarker.co.uk where you can find details of forthcoming events.

You can read more reviews of A Swift Return by Fiona Barker and Howard Gray on Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/205033932-a-swift-return and Amazon: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Swift-Return-Fiona-Barker-ebook/dp/B0CTKQJ1WQ/

You can buy copies of A Swift Return by Fiona Barker and Howard Gray from your local bookshop, or online at uk.bookshop.org which supports local, independent bookshops.