Homecoming

One of the most memorable YA books of the last 50 years begins with a mother abandoning her four children, who range in age from 6 to 13, in a shopping mall in Connecticut in the middle of a road trip. Homecoming, published in 1981, follows the four Tillerman siblings, with 13-year-old Dicey serving as the narrator, as they realize their mother does not intend to return and embark on a journey to complete the road trip and find a relative they have never met. The shock of being left behind by their mother is only the beginning of a trip that moves through a bygone portrait of the American Northeast as the story confronts the trauma of abandonment and considers the comfort inherent to family. Voigt followed Homecoming with six more books in a series called the Tillerman Cycle. —Peter Allen Clark

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