A tender picture book about a veteran’s PTSD and a family’s love for each other—on good days and hard days—from award-winning creators Winsome Bingham and Rahele Jomepour Bell
Momma wears combat boots, a camouflage jacket, and a U.S. ARMY tag on her chest. She is a fighter for her country’s freedom, but she is also a fighter for her family. When Momma comes home from a long deployment, however, something has changed. Our narrator, Momma’s “Baby," misses the big hugs, uniform fashion shows, and music mornings they used to share. And she really misses planting vegetables together. Now her Momma won’t even come out to the garden. But maybe, just maybe, she can bring the garden to Momma.
Missing Momma is the poignant and ultimately hopeful, comforting story of a child with a parent affected by PTSD. Sensitively written by Winsome Bingham and movingly illustrated by Rahele Jomepour Bell, Missing Momma beautifully reminds kids that a family’s love endures even on days that aren’t picture perfect.
Praise
***STARRED REVIEW***
"[M]asterfully rendered...Bingham’s text is honest yet child-friendly...A thoughtful, empathetic, and stirring child’s-eye view of an all-too-common struggle."
—Kirkus Reviews
"This quiet, contemplative picture book sensitively explores the chaotic trauma that war wreaks upon its soldiers, and Bingham gives an honest picture not just of Momma’s PTSD but also its secondary effects on the narrator, who aches for a mother who might no longer exist. The art...evokes complicated emotions with stunning ease."
—The Bulletin of the Center for Children’s Books
