Homecoming

Homecoming (1981) is Cynthia Voigt’s first book in the Tillerman Cycle series, a seven-book young adult series. The novel earned praise and recognition as a National Book Award finalist; other books in the series won a Newberry medal and a Newberry honor. Following four young, abandoned siblings navigating large stretches of New England and the Northeastern United States, the novel explores themes about home, family, and resilience.

This guide refers to the 1981 edition, which was reprinted in eBook format by Atheneum Books for Young Readers, an imprint of Simon & Schuster.

Content Warning: The source material explores content relating to mental illness, domestic violence, food insecurity, and child hunger. Additionally, the novel uses slurs directed towards people with intellectual disabilities, which this guide references but obscures.

Plot Summary

The novel begins in a mall parking lot in Peewauket, Connecticut, in the early summer of the late 1970s. The four Tillerman siblings (Dicey, James, Maybeth, and Sammy) wait in their family car for their mother, Liza Tillerman, to return, though they become increasingly worried as hours pass. Dicey, the oldest daughter and the novel’s protagonist, instinctively knows Liza abandoned the children indefinitely; she devises a plan for the children to travel to their Aunt Cilla’s house in Bridgeport, Connecticut.