This is a very quiet story, but also a very important one. Loved the illustrations. Planning to use this story to help teach and illustrate selflessness.

Ali lives with his great-grandmother in a tiny clay house at the edge of the desert. Just her and him. Just him and her. Together they are happy but Ali can't help noticing that his beloved great grandmother's health is deteriorating and how much older she looks.

One day just out of the blue he asks her a question that she takes a little while to answer. He wants to know if all of her life's dreams have been fulfilled. She has to reflect back on her life and when is satisfied she answers... yes, all but one. She goes on to tell him that she always wanted to see the sea but sadly at her age and with her weak legs that dream is an impossibility now. Sigh!

The next morning brave Ali departs from their humble abode on a mission of love. He scoops up a small pail and off he treks to the seaside, a two day walk away from their home. He spends a near-frightening night under an unfamiliar palm tree but he is determined to see that his great grandmother's wish is granted. If she cannot go the sea then he will bring the sea to her. Will Ali succeed and bring happiness and contentment home to her in his little pail?

This intergenerational story with its very different but hauntingly beautiful illustrations is all about family bonds, unconditional love, perseverance and dreams coming true. I adore the deep love and kindness that Ali shows for his great-grandmother and how heroic he is to brave that solo journey to fulfill that one last dream for her when he is so young to do so.

It is a very heartwarming tale and even tho Ali and his great-grandmother have very little materially in their life.... emotionally and spiritually they have everything that money cannot buy. Any story that highlights kindness, compassion and courage should be read to kids of all ages. My heart is touched by the story and I highly recommend it.

ARC Copy...stylized in cultural artistic way of a boy relating to his grandma via experiences and sense revovling around the sea. Interesting to read.

Sweet story about a boy and his connection with his grandmother. I loved that this story has a theme that crosses cultures and touches the hearts of all ages.

What a sweet story! I liked the uniqueness of the illustration style and thought it fit perfectly with the tone of the book. Ali's thoughtfulness, compassion and determination is a great example for kids.

Ali and his great grandmother live together at the edge of the desert. As Ali notices her increasing age, he finds himself admitting that she will not live forever and so he asks her if all her dreams have been fulfilled. She reflects and admits all but one: she never saw the sea. It's only a two-day's walk, but she found herself perpetually putting it off until it was feasibly impossible, given her weak body.

Ali wants her to have all her wishes met, so he vows to walk to the sea and bring it back to her in a bucket. He gets to see the expanse of water for the first time: "He sits awhile, contemplating it. But not for too long -- one doesn't keep great-grandmothers waiting." We are touched but not surprised that she is moved by his loving gesture.

The illustrations are whimsical and remind me of playful caricatures. This is a sweet story of family devotion and sacrifices made out of love.

In A Drop of the Sea, Ali makes a long journey to bring back a bit of the sea to his great-grandmother who had never fulfilled her longtime dream of making the trip to see the sea. I was really looking forward to the illustrations in this one based on the image on the cover -- that lined paper worked into the setting seems like a fun spin on the typical picture-book illustration.

Unfortunately, while I did enjoy the story, most of the pictures left me a bit cold. The people were stylized just a bit too much for me, to the point that at first I mistook the great-grandmother for an observatory dome. At times I had to really examine the picture closely to figure out which was Ali's ear and which was his nose.

I did love the use of different kinds of paper being worked into the scenes, and I really appreciated how apt the selections often were, like using a map for the ground while Ali was on his trip. I would have loved to have seen even more of that playful design throughout the book.

The story here is touching and I'm sure the art will be more appealing to some. It just didn't do it for me.

Thank you to NetGalley and Kids Can Press for providing me with a free electronic ARC of this book.

At the beginning of this book I wasn't really on its wavelength, with the initial page seemingly translated into summary, describing the set-up in a very passive manner. But when the quest story begins, of a young boy going to visit the sea as surrogate for his great-grandma (a huge figure dwarfing the stool she sits on in her old age), I think you can't help but warm to the sentiment. Yes, it is sentimental, slight, and a little nonsensical, but it's warm-hearted enough, and the approach is certainly visually distinctive. I did wonder if the font was a little small on the page for a for-sharing title, however – not only does it get lost in the artist's presentation of the distant African horizons, it also looks like a dense chunk of script at times. Close enough to four stars as makes no difference.