The story, published by the Takatuka publishing firm, deals with friendship and the value of meeting children from other countries who speak different languages from our own.
   
        “The day Saida arrived, it seemed to me like she had lost all of her words. So I tried to look for them in every hidden corner, in holes, drawers and stitchings… to see whether I could use them to wipe away the tears which she shed down her long eyelashes in thick silence. The day Saida arrived, Daddy explained to me that my friend probably hadn’t lost all of her words, but instead she probably didn’t feel like taking them all out from inside her, because they were different from the words here. –In Morocco– he said– your words wouldn’t do you much good either. And that is how I found out that in Saida’s country they speak a different language from ours: Arabic.”
       
        Susana Gómez Redondo (text)
        Born in Soria in 1969, she has earned degrees in Information Sciences and Literary Theory and Comparative Literature. At present, she gives classes on Teaching Spanish Language at the Escuela Universitaria de Educación de Soria and writes children’s and youth literature in the cultural supplement of El Norte de Castilla. She is the author of travel guidebooks and short stories. Her love of children’s literature came with the birth of her son, and since then she has published three illustrated albums and a children’s poetry album.
   
        Sonja Wimmer (illustration)
        Born in Munich in 1974, Ms. Wimmer moved to Barcelona to study illustration at La Llotja, Advanced Design School, and since then she has lived and worked in that city, amid paintbrushes, colors and magical worlds, making illustrations for publishing firms from different countries. In 2011, she was given a prize at the Moonbeam Children's Book Awards and in 2012 the International Latino Book Awards.
 

If you would like to learn something about Arabic letters and try to write your name, like the main character in “The Day Saida Arrived,” sign up for this short introductory workshop on the Arabic alphabet and the beautiful art of calligraphy.
   
It will be taking place in a classroom at the Casa Árabe Language Center, after the book presentation. You do not have to bring any special materials (Casa Árabe will provide them), but you must sign up in advance, because there is a limited number of spaces.