THE PLAYDATE

A youngster contends with complicated emotions while visiting a friend.

A mother and an unnamed child, who narrates, leave their cozy, humble apartment and set off for Henry Henriksson’s sprawling house. They take two buses and a subway and then must walk. Once they arrive, the protagonist and Henry play hide-and-seek and chase Henry’s dog. In the background, the child’s mother, apparently employed as a housekeeper for Henry’s family, hauls the vacuum up the stairs and squeezes soap into a bucket. On the way home, the protagonist regretfully pulls out a little robot, stolen from Henry’s house and resembling one the young narrator had longingly gazed at in a toy store. The theft has likely put Mom in a bind; she says that they’ll take it back to Henry’s next week, but she seems to understand the feelings of envy that these visits inspire in the child. This Swedish import considers how children make sense of the unspoken differences that arise due to socioeconomic disparities; one scene finds Henry and the narrator playing king and servant, with Henry kissing the protagonist’s feet. Brandelius’ straightforward and direct first-person text pairs well with Dackenberg’s spare watercolor, gouache, and paper cutout illustrations, with their washed-out palette. The story approaches the child’s and mother’s lives with empathy, imbuing both with dignity. The characters are pale-skinned.

A frankly told, child’s-eye view of the intersection of friendship and socioeconomic status.