Follows a young child and his imagination as he wonders about life in different places. He considers life in places of hardship, such as war, immigration journeys, child labor, and natural disasters. It ends by him reflecting that he is his own home, and that is a part of him wherever he may be. ( )

Impactful and self-reflecting, a young girl wanders through life wondering what it would be like to live somewhere else. She ignites readers to consider the world around us through many lenses.

young boy wonders what it would be like to live somewhere else ( )

Thoughtful and meditative, unafraid to consider other settings, imagined and real: deserts, icebergs, a coal-mining mountain, various frightening but real scenarios (fleeing war, hiding, carrying everything, living alone in a city). The soft, dreamy illustrations pair perfectly with the what-if text. A good choice for children who are wondering about questions of identity, place, chance, and privilege.

"Everything might have been different
if I were somewhere else.
Why am I me, and not someone else?
And why am I here?"

Translated from Norwegian. Illustrations in pastel and colored pencils on paper.

See also: Home by Carson Ellis, This Is How We Do It by Matt Lamothe, Teacup by Rebecca Young and Matt Ottley ( )

The young narrator of this Norwegian picture-book wonders what his life would be like, if he lived somewhere else, questioning why he is where he is. Considering the possibilities - what would life be like if he lived alone in a great city, or somewhere he was forced to work (as so many children are), or perhaps in a war-torn country? - he ponders whether it would be possible for him to move, to come to the country in which he currently resides...

Originally published in Norwegian as Hvorfor er jeg her?, this gently contemplative picture-book is the second I have read from author Constance Ørbeck-Nilssen and illustrator Akin Düzakin, following upon their I'm Right Here. Like that earlier book, Why Am I Here? is quite phiosophical, raising a number of questions that young people might have as they grow older about life, the world, and their place in it. Given the description of war-torn countries, and the depiction of people fleeing by land and by sea, it's difficult not to read this one as an exploration of the current migrant crisis in Europe, but although I do believe it is meant to address that issue, I think it also has wider implications, and can be used to launch a more general discussion of those existential questions that are (in the end) unanswerable. I appreciated this one, finding the narrative interesting and the artwork lovely, but it wasn't quite as poignant somehow, as this team's other book. Perhaps because the loss depicted there was personal and individual, rather than communal and hypothetical? Whatever the case may be, I would recommend this one to those seeking more philosophical picture-books about the world, our place in it, and our relationship to people from other places. ( )