In A House with No Door, author Amy Fell­ner Dominy and illus­tra­tor Rotem Teplow invite young read­ers to explore the cel­e­bra­tion of Sukkot through an enchant­i­ng para­dox. A sukkah is a tem­po­rary struc­ture built to com­mem­o­rate the tran­si­tion­al peri­od when, after their exo­dus from Egypt, the Israelites dwelled in booths before arriv­ing at their ulti­mate des­ti­na­tion. Yet elab­o­rate care in plan­ning, putting up, and dec­o­rat­ing the sukkah is an essen­tial part of the holiday’s obser­vance. This mod­est hut must be strong enough to with­stand a week out­doors, only to be dis­man­tled at the festival’s conclusion.

The text’s poet­ic beau­ty ele­vates its mes­sage and encour­ages young read­ers’ excite­ment about the hol­i­day. The ​“house” has a floor of ​“cool, dark earth” marked with mys­te­ri­ous foot­prints. It is cov­ered by ​“a roof that is not a roof.” The light that par­tial­ly enters leaves stripes on the ground and on a cat seat­ed there, as well as on the striped shirt of a child. The nar­ra­tive voice con­veys won­der, from this moment of near-empti­ness to the busy time of com­mu­ni­ty activ­i­ty as chil­dren hang up fruit and paper chains.

Teplow’s bright­ly col­ored pic­tures com­bine the nat­ur­al envi­ron­ment with artis­tic activ­i­ty. Two chil­dren paint a still life of pome­gran­ates, grapes, and oth­er fruits, reflect­ing their inter­pre­ta­tion of the real foods depict­ed in a stun­ning two-page spread. The sukkah is small, but there is ​“room for every­one.” An etrog is sim­i­lar in appear­ance and taste to the famil­iar lemon, yet it is not a lemon. A father and child shake the lulav togeth­er and its del­i­cate sound resem­bles a lul­la­by, although this rit­u­al is unique to the holiday.

The multi­gen­er­a­tional feast at the book’s con­clu­sion empha­sizes the mys­ti­cal ele­ment of this his­tor­i­cal com­mem­o­ra­tion. The house’s lack of a door is a wel­come to every­one, unit­ed in a ​“mag­i­cal world” of ​“you and us and me and we.” With a per­fect bal­ance of real­ism and spir­i­tu­al­i­ty, author and illus­tra­tor have con­struct­ed a mean­ing­ful inter­pre­ta­tion of Sukkot for

chil­dren.