Sailing the Milky Way
A Passport to the Unimagined
A fanciful interpretation of a nighttime ritual, the energetic picture book Sailing the Milky Way centers creative dreaming and looking forward.
A peaceful bedtime story, Eileen Ferriter’s picture book Sailing the Milky Way follows a courageous dragonfly through its explorations.
While he’s getting ready for bed, a boy asks to hear the story about Yuri the dragonfly again. Yuri’s parents tuck him into his leaf bed with a story of their own: he was “born of light and love” and “entered this world with a destiny.” Yuri’s flight from the seas to the “rainbow’s end” and on through the galaxy is detailed; he returns to Earth with anticipation for the new day to come.
Driven by directives to imagine, think, and leapfrog, this is a straightforward story that is marked by poetic turns: Yuri is persuaded to “Play hopscotch in the wind” and “Listen to the comet’s tales, dance to the music of the moons.” In receiving such encouragements, Yuri becomes a stand-in for humans audiences who are, in turn, subtly exhorted to embrace their own adventures too.
In the illustrations, star-flecked backgrounds, swirling designs, and rows of sailboats evoke movement. The dragonfly is set against psychedelic colors, spheres, and patterns; these ably interpret the text’s abstractions, including “new horizons” and “waves of infinite space.” Still, this dreamy story lacks a convincing rationale. Despite its soothing tones, it is not clarified why the dragonfly family has a prominent place, nor does the book reveal why Yuri’s tale is being conveyed through the intermediary of a generic boy whose sole purpose is to prompt its telling and who never reappears after. And the self-empowering aspects of the tale, such as about the voyage being of one’s own making, are too familiar to be impactful.
A fanciful interpretation of a nighttime ritual, the energetic picture book Sailing the Milky Way centers creative dreaming and looking forward.
Reviewed by
Karen Rigby
Disclosure: This article is not an endorsement, but a review. The publisher of this book provided free copies of the book and paid a small fee to have their book reviewed by a professional reviewer. Foreword Reviews and Clarion Reviews make no guarantee that the publisher will receive a positive review. Foreword Magazine, Inc. is disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255.
