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Title
Arrival
Author
Shaun Tan
Age Range
9 - 12
Brief Description
Grade 7
Up—Tan captures the displacement and awe with which immigrants respond
to their new surroundings in this wordless graphic novel. It depicts the
journey of one man, threatened by dark shapes that cast shadows on his
family's life, to a new country. The only writing is in an invented
alphabet, which creates the sensation immigrants must feel when they
encounter a strange new language and way of life. A wide variety of
ethnicities is represented in Tan's hyper-realistic style, and the sense
of warmth and caring for others, regardless of race, age, or background,
is present on nearly every page. Young readers will be fascinated by the
strange new world the artist creates, complete with floating elevators
and unusual creatures, but may not realize the depth of meaning or
understand what the man's journey symbolizes. More sophisticated
readers, however, will grasp the sense of strangeness and find
themselves participating in the man's experiences. They will linger over
the details in the beautiful sepia pictures and will likely pick up the
book to pore over it again and again.
