A young child traveling on the ship Mexique isn't sure where she's going, but knows it is far away and that she'll stay for a few months, which her mother compared to an "an extra-long summer vacation" during a goodbye hug. She's one of 456 children on board without parents, but an older girl named Clara takes care of her. The children imagine where they are going, and sometimes at night they cry. They dream "the houses are crumbling, and their memories are blank." A crowd waving white handkerchiefs greets them on arrival, and they disembark, believing that they've left the war behind them. The child's uncertainty and hope, and a sense of experiencing while not necessarily comprehending, are all imbedded in the distinctive voice of the narrative, while the sophisticated, mostly sepia-toned illustrations emphasize a sense of foreboding and fear. An afterword offers additional information about the children of Spanish Republicans aboard the Mexique, who were sent as refugees to Mexico during the Spanish Civil War. Their anticipated short stay became a permanent exile, with most remaining permanently in Mexico. (Ages 6-10)

This poetic picture book introduces readers to the 456 children of Morelia, Spain who were sent to Mexico by boat to escape the Spanish Civil War. The muted palette echoes the fear, loss, and sacrifice these families and children experienced. The gestures of parental love and the variety of children's faces are haunting and evocative. A carefully researched and moving afterword explains the history, almost lost to our collective memories and pertinent to the current refugee situation.

2021 USBBY Outstanding International Book.

The author lives in Chile.

Spanish. Originally published in Spanish as Mexique: El nombre del barco by Alboroto Ediciones in 2018. English translation by Elisa Amado published in the United States by Eerdmans in 2020.

On May 27, 1937, over four hundred children sailed for Morelia, Mexico, fleeing the violence of the Spanish Civil War. Home was no longer safe, and Mexico was welcoming refugees by the thousands. Each child packed a suitcase and boarded the Mexique, expecting to return home in a few months. This was just a short trip, an extra-long summer vacation, they thought. But the war did not end in a few months, and the children stayed, waiting and wondering, in Mexico. When the war finally ended, a dictator—the Fascist Francisco Franco—ruled Spain. Home was even more dangerous than before. 

This moving book invites readers onto the Mexique with the “children of Morelia,” many of whom never returned to Spain during Franco’s almost forty-year regime. Poignant and poetically told, Mexique opens important conversations about hope, resilience, and the lives of displaced people in the past and today.