Through the Forest by Yijing Li

Oh this book!

Such a moving story and illustrations and told in such a beautiful, gentle way. I actually did tear up reading it. I would one million percent recommend this to those not just those looking at a way to deal with grief or loss but for even those little moments when your child loses their favourite hair clip or remembers something they once had that they no longer do.

This quickly hit my top 5 fave Babipur books

Thank you to team babipur for bringing in this book! It is beautifully illustrated that talks about how a child's memories filled his feeling of emptiness, and then with both good and bad memories, found the peace/joy to move forward in his life.

This book prompted us to talk about the events that has happened in our day/month/year/lives. Some of which my children being only 3 & 5yo, have no recollection at all. We also spoke about our upcoming family reunion with family abroad and that although we won't be able to see them often, we can work on building memories together to remember them by.

All in all, a gorgeous book that has helped spark some meaningful conversation with my young children.

What a truly lovely story! Almost cried this week reading this one with M & M!

The story starts with a young boy walking through a forest , and he can’t find his way back. He finds emptiness, and together they find lots of memory’s from the little boys past that help them find the way, emptiness carry’s them for the little boy until he is full and they are out of the Forrest. The little boy asks emptiness to continue there journey together, but because he’s so full , emptiness says he cannot and says the little boy will now be fine on his own. And if he ever gets lost again, he will be there to help guide the way.
This is such a lovely metaphor for the child’s feelings and because of emptiness his mind is now at ease.
The illustrations are beautiful! They only way to describe them is dreamy! It’s like your dreaming while reading the story.

Matthew loved it and was glad he could read it himself. He is 7 and has a pretty good reading level for his age.

Really lovely book talking about memories. My daughter found it quite sad when she read it alone so it was a nice one to read together and talk about.

We adore this book ❤️

We lost someone very dear to us over Christmas so my little ones were able to relate to Emptiness and all the memories that came up throughout the story. It brought up important conversations and I felt it gave us a safe space to discuss our loved one, the sadness of losing them as well as all the happy things we'd like to remember about them. My 9 year old is usually very cagey about his feelings but this did allow him to express his thoughts and as a result he is more comfortable talking about his beloved Hen Nain.

This book is perfect for younger ones following a bereavement, but also as a general day to day book about memories and taking time out to remember what's important to you.