Homeless children, their mother and an old hobo all find shelter under a bridge in Paris.
How cold it is when three small children are forced to live under a bridge in Paris with their homeless mother! While she works they stay near the river and discover an old hobo, Armand. The first lines in the book belong to him:
“Once there was an old hobo named Armand who wouldn’t have lived anywhere but in Paris. So that is where he lived.
Everything that he owned could be pushed around in an old baby buggy without any hood, so he had no worries about rents or burglars. All the ragged clothing he owned was on his back, so he didn’t need to bother with trunks or dry-cleaners.”
This book about homeless children befriending an old hobo was published in 1958 and was a Newbery Honor Book in 1959.
I read this short novel out loud to my children at a time when we were between homes, living out of our car for a while. It was a blessing to them to know they weren’t the only homeless children.
Leave a Reply