Mum and Dad Glue

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However in doing this, Gray only places the reader into the situation of the protagonist, wondering when their inner turmoil will be over. In the second half of the book, where the main character realizes that it is ok and that hearts cannot be put back together with glue the images are no longer broken.

Beautiful book from a child’s perspective of handling divorce- really makes you think about how a child may see a divorce of parents. This is an excellent book that follows a child's journey of coming to accept the separation of his parents.

It's not really a book that young children who aren't going through divorcing parents would want to read - it'd ask more questions than it asks. By telling the story from the perspective of a child, the story creates a sense of longing in the reader and allows them to be swept up in the narrative as if they were in the text themselves. He explains to the reader that although his parents are apart they will always love him, and if they could have resolved their differences they would have done it by now. Beautifully rhyming story that flows and in with really lovely language tackles the issue of parent separation.

It is something I have seen happening in other books about divorce, and it always breaks my heart and makes me tear up. In spite of his initial apprehension, Gray said that he wanted to provide a view of divorce (from a child's perspective), that was not only just, but one that lent itself to honesty and integrity. He goes on a hunt to try and find some glue to stick them back together but then realises that you cant find glue for the heart. The child's concept of sticking his parents back together with glue is so down to earth and truly places the reader into the mindset of a young person desperate for his mum and dad to stay together. Having personally used this book to communicate divorce with younger family members, it is definitely a book I would recommend to any teacher etc!A powerful poem which follows a boy who’s parents are getting divorced and feels like he is to blame and struggling to come to terms with it. This rhyming story is brilliantly told with a powerful message that even though his parents may be broken, their love for him is not. This book addresses many feelings and questions children may have related to such controversial themes. Gray did not want to give false hope to any child that could be experiencing the demise of their parents’ marriage - this would be unethical, and could be potentially damaging to a child's emotional state (especially, for example, if Gray wrote a story where the parent's got back together, and everything mapped out harmoniously, because that could create a distorted, misleading expectation in a child's mind). Reinforces the view that the child is not to blame and will continued to be loved as before, and sometimes it is not possible to 'fix' a problem.