This is another example of a wordless picturebook that deals with the topic of the migrant crisis. We Had to Leave is gentler and happier than the other examples in the corpus: Migrando [Migrating], Orizzonti [Horizons], and Mediterraneo [The Mediterranean]. Whereas the majority of wordless picturebooks that treat this subject do so as a tragedy, this Finnish example of the subgenre does so as a message of hope. A family flee violence in a warm country and join a trail of refugees towards the ocean. Reaching the beach, they board boats, and are carried through stormy seas to a foreign land. The text does not stop there, but shows the arrival of the migrants and their eventual successful documentation and integration into an unnamed country. The petals that fall from the trees in the first picture are mirrored in the children’s experience of first snowfall at the close of the novel. The visual storytelling is exquisite and children will be able to model their own creations on the sophisticated techniques used in the construction of this narrative. For example, many pages emphasise one sole object in order to provide a key to a change in the narrative. This beautiful and uplifting wordless picturebook is an important contrast to the tragedies that carry the weight of other texts dealing with the same themes. It is particularly important as an example of the wordless picturebook that offers an affirmative representation of new citizenship for refugees.
