Hideaway by Melania Longo

Escape to the world of make believe where imagination takes flight.

This charming excursion to the world of imaginative play features poetic text accompanied by exquisite illustrations by a recent Italian Children's Laureate.

"Our hideaway is a house made of slender branches and singing leaves. No one can enter, except my little brother and I. Even though there's not much room, for us it has no limits. We can travel to the savanna or to snow capped lands, enjoy a five o'clock tea or sleep beneath the stars. Until we hear a far-off voice growing nearer as it calls to us . . . has someone found us in our hideaway?"

This timeless ode to creative play provides a welcome reminder to unplug from the distractions of the modern world, be present in the moment, and ready to travel wherever our imaginations might take us.

Alessandro Sanna is considered one of Italy's leading contemporary illustrators. He has earned wide recognition across Europe as an illustrator and author, and his work has appeared in The New York Times Book Review and The New Yorker. He is a prolific and popular creator of illustrated books for children and readers of all ages and has received many awards and had many exhibitions. He lives and works in Mantua, Italy. Alessandro Sanna recently served as the Italian Children’s Laureate.

Melania Longo is an art historian with a specialization in Museum Education Services, with a focus on Children's Literature. She uses art as a tool in training courses, for children and adults, cultivating it as a deposit of knowledge, narratives and experiences, to learn to see and know. She develops study activities around illustrated books, with particular reference to the reading of images and their role in the formation of the imagination of each of us. Hideaway is her first book to be translated into English.