Love and family emanate from every page of The Relatives Came by Cynthia Rylant (1985). I recall talking about this book in a welcome statement I wrote for a Sunday church service. I laughed at the awkwardness of distant relatives staying for weeks and weeks, a discomfort I projected onto the story. The Relatives Came feels different as I read it many years later. This is a story of family warmth I did not know as a child. My parents groaned when relatives came to visit. Uncles, aunts, and cousins sometimes showed up unannounced for dinner. And they stayed a very long time—three hours! So, I reread Rylant’s story envious of relatives who brought with them lots of hugs. They helped with the garden and fixed broken things. They played games. They played music. They had fun. Stephen Gammell’s pictures show their joy.
