Would You Like To Bring Home A Star? Star in the Jar by Sam Hay

My little brother likes looking for treasure.

Kids love to bring home findings--some of it nifty or glittery or colorful, like feathers, or shiny rocks, some of it more in the trash category.

But one day he found something extra special.

So special I thought it must belong to someone else.

Big sister takes charge and asks everyone--the girl at school who knows everything, the lunch ladies, the sheriff, even the fairies-- how to find the proper owner.

Nobody claims the star.

Little brother takes that for an omen that he can keep it.

He put it in a jar and carried it everywhere.

The star grows brighter as night comes on, but somehow it doesn't seem glad to be shut up in the jar. Can he keep it? Yes. But should he?

Little Brother wants to help. He makes a sign.

LOST. ONE SMALL STAR.

But there's no claimant for the sad little star. Could they teach it fly up to the sky? Its little light is so small that perhaps the big stars cannot even spot the missing star from space. Would the lonely little star have to stay in the jar always? Can the kind kids find a way for the star in the jar to phone home?

Yes, they can, in Sam Hay's sweet story of having a "forever friend" in high places, in his Star in the Jar(Sourcebooks/Jabberwocky, 2018), illustrated with gentle charm in the sweet illustrations of Sarah Massini. Says Kirkus Reviews, "Hay carefully keeps an even tone, never letting the whimsy descend into treacle and always maintaining a sense of wonder. Tender and loving."