Title: The Wish

Author: Ken Elliott

Illustrator: Whitney Gardner

Publisher/Year: Adamo/2014

Summary: A father and daughter share a simple tradition and an enduring bond that spans the decades.

The Wish is a tender tale that will tug at your heartstrings. It’s about a young girl and her father and their daily walks to the park to toss coins into the fountain and make wishes. It’s also about a father watching his little girl grow up into a teenager and then into a woman and seeing her less and less, until one day, when both father and daughter are old, she comes home again.

The carefully rendered black and white illustrations pair nicely with the gentleness of the story and I like how they beg to be colored in by the reader’s imagination. Any parent who has watched his/her child grow up and move away will most certainly relate to this story, but so will anyone who has a special connection with another person. What I like most of all is the full-circle ending, the reunion of father and daughter and the affirmation that no matter how far away you go or how much time has passed, your special bonds with loved ones will never break. The Wish is a sweet, sincere story ready to be shared with the special people in your life, children or adults.