You Can Go Home Again

Margaret Bunel Edwards writes novels for young adults. She is the author
of Little Stitch and The Ocean Between.

After a happy celebration that takes place when her mother’s country
is liberated, Annie asks her mother to tell her about growing up in
Prague. Her mother describes her aunt and uncle’s home and tells how
she played the piano with her uncle, a concert pianist. Best of all, she
loved to play with four ebony elephants. One day she broke the tusk of
the biggest one but her father repaired it. When war started, she was
sent to America and never saw her family or the elephants again.

Annie persuades her parents to return to Prague to find the uncle’s
home and the elephants. They locate the uncle’s house, which has been
badly neglected. It is lived in by strangers who know nothing of the
elephants. No one knows of them. Soon the holiday is over, but, before
the family returns home, they go to a small restaurant across the street
from the uncle’s house and there, to Annie’s delight, she sees the
elephants in a glass case. The owner explains that the uncle came to eat
there often, and one day brought the elephants. He was sure his niece
would come back some day and she was to have them. Everyone hugged and
the elephants are now safe in Annie’s home.

This very satisfying story is beautifully told and illustrated. The
pictures are painted in soft colors and harmonize perfectly with the
autobiographical plot. Highly recommended.