The Postcard Project

by Maggie Lauren Brown, Asma Enayeh (Illustrator)

Lola loves summer visits at Gram's seaside home. But when a wave of homesickness hits and ordinary phone calls and letters don't help, Lola and Gram craft their own extraordinary homemade postcards to send their love from the coast.

This intergenerational story shows readers that postcard materials hide everywhere--from cereal boxes to garden weeds--and includes an easy DIY project sure to spread kindness right off the page.

Genres: Picture Books

40 pages, Kindle Edition

Published April 25, 2023

Reviews

[Luna Alice · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Postcard Project by Maggie Lauren Brown, with charming illustrations by Asma Enayeh, is a delightful picture book that celebrates family bonds, creativity, and the joy of sending love across distances. The story follows Lola, who struggles with homesickness during summer visits to her grandmother’s seaside home. Together, Lola and Gram transform ordinary materials, from cereal boxes to garden weeds, into extraordinary homemade postcards, finding imaginative ways to stay connected and share their affection.

Brown’s narrative is gentle, heartwarming, and engaging, showing young readers that love and creativity can bridge distances and bring joy to others. The story encourages curiosity, resourcefulness, and empathy, while modeling intergenerational collaboration in a playful, relatable way.

Enayeh’s illustrations perfectly complement the text, bringing warmth, whimsy, and personality to the seaside setting and to Lola and Gram’s creative endeavors. Each page is visually rich, highlighting both the beauty of the natural world and the magic of imagination.

The Postcard Project is perfect for read-alouds, classroom activities, or at-home storytelling, and it includes a fun, hands-on DIY idea that inspires children to make and share their own postcards. This book is more than a story, it’s an invitation for kids to connect, create, and spread kindness in their own world.

A timeless, uplifting read, The Postcard Project is a must-have for families, educators, and young readers who love stories about imagination, love, and meaningful connection.

[Lynn · Rating 4 out of 5]

This a really sweet little book about a young girl spending some summer weeks with her beloved grandmother. Despite enjoying her time there, Lola experiences a wave of homesickness. Gram helps Lola cope with it with a craft project that creates her own postcards to send home.

Back matter includes instructions on for kids on how to make postcards.

Kids love getting and sending mail and this is an easy project that will occupy and engage youngsters and make the recipients VERY happy.

[Viviane Elbee · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love writing and receiving postcards, so of course I really like this book! And how fun that the back of the book includes instructions for kids to try their own postcard projects!

[Lorena · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's adorable and perfect and an excellent craft idea.

[Leslie · Rating 5 out of 5]

This would be such a fun project to do with kids! You can make postcards out of anything, and who doesn’t love getting mail, from a person!

[Chantel · Rating 3 out of 5]

Lola spends a couple of weeks every summer with her Gram. This is a time that she cherishes, a time that she anticipates, & a time that she is eager to see arrive. However, this year, Lola begins to miss the life she leaves behind during her summer visit. She reflects on her home, her friends, & the everyday occurrences that she is used to, leaving her with a new feeling: homesickness.

I appreciated the illustrations of this story. Asma Enayeh brings Lola’s world to the forefront in such warm ways; her life & adventures feel tangible & real, as though they were only a neighbourhood away. I found the cohesion between the story itself & the illustrations fantastic. Every character has a role to play & young readers are encouraged by colours & shapes to make their way through the world.

With that being said, I found the ending a bit confusing. Throughout the story we see Lola & her Gram find new ways to transform their adventures into little postcards for Lola’s parents. This combats the feeling of homesickness while giving them fun things to do, on top of the array of joy they cultivate daily. When it is time for Lola to return home, I figured she would possibly adopt the practice within her familiar environment, as a way to bring her Gram into her quotidian.

Instead, we see Lola anticipate postcards that she will send to her Gram, which have already been made. Who made these postcards? Did her parents think ahead & assume that Lola would want to have her Gram included in her everyday life, just as Lola included them in her summer adventures? I suppose we could view this transition as Lola anticipating all of the things she could transform into postcards but, with the pages flipped to cards already set to post, this did not feel like the case.

For that reason alone, I feel that the story was missing part of the message. It is lovely to have someone you love so much that you end up missing them. This feeling, as Gram taught Lola, can be fostered by including those folks in the fun you are having by proxy. No distance is too far for love; no mountains too high or oceans too wide. Therefore, it would have been nice to see Lola remember this & work towards sending her Gram reminders of love & fondness from her home.

This is just my opinion. I think that young readers won’t necessarily have a problem with this as it is easy to become swept away in the illustrations & imagery of making homemade postcards. In all, this was a very sweet story that fosters a reminder in all readers that, though we might be far apart & the moon rises at different hours, the sun shines for others when we are asleep or the weather be changed altogether; we carry the memory of those we love with us always, no matter where we are.

Thank you to Edelweiss+, Beaming Books, & Maggie Lauren Brown for the free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!

[Cristina Raymer · Rating 5 out of 5]

THE POSTCARD PROJECT is a heartwarming book about addressing feelings of homesickness, staying close to loved ones, and creative problem-solving. Lola spends every summer with her Gram, a tradition she anticipates and enjoys. Together, they have many adventures and turn the ordinary into the extraordinary. Then one day, Lola feels homesick. Gram helps Lola identify her feelings and encourages her to find ways to connect with her family and friends. Lola discovers she can make homemade postcards to send to her loved ones to help include them in her summer adventures. When Lola's time with Gram is done, she returns home to find homemade postcards that were mailed to her from her friends as well! Through Maggie Lauren Brown's lyrical text and Asma Enayeh's lively illustrations, THE POSTCARD PROJECT is the perfect book to help children identify their feelings and find creative solutions to help them feel better. The end even includes instructions for children to make their own homemade postcards! This book is a must-have for every household!

[Karen Yin · Rating 5 out of 5]

The perfect book for crafty kids! While staying at Gram's for the summer, Lola gets homesick. After she talks to Gram about it, they try texting, phone calls, and video calls, but the homesickness is still there. Inspired by the colorful postcards around town, Lola comes up with a clever idea for doing something extra special for her parents: homemade postcards made from cardboard packaging found around the house! The Postcard Project shows how Lola copes through creativity, replacing homesickness with happiness, and how sending postcards spreads the happiness around. The vivid lyrical writing is accompanied by endearing illustrations of Lola and her family, the town, the beach, the garden, and the kitchen. At the end, there are simple instructions for young readers to make their own postcard project—how fun is that?

[Elia · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is brimming with love, warmth, and joy. Enayeh's vibrant illustrations work wonderfully with Brown's warm, breezy writing style. Together, they tell the story of a girl, Lola, who gets homesick while visiting her grandmother, and the creative way that Lola comes up with (with some help from Gram) to help her overcome those feelings. Lola's feelings of homesickness are poignantly conveyed, and many kids (and perhaps parents, too!) will no doubt relate. The author also shows the importance of acknowledging one's feelings as a first step toward working through them. Pages at the end of the book provide clear, simple instructions for kids who want to do their own postcard project (with a little help from an adult).

[Theediscerning · Rating 4 out of 5]

Quite a pleasant read, this sees a young girl packed off, as usual, for the summer with her gran. Smothered with homesickness all of a sudden, nothing feels like the right idea to get in touch with her parents, until she hits on repurposing bits of cardboard as postcards home. The artwork is quite delightful, and even if the 'project' as it is doesn't feel that remarkable, it doesn't detract from the warmth of the piece. Four stars are perhaps a touch generous, but not that much.

[Shirin Shamsi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Maggie Lauren Brown’s lyrical language, paired with Asma Enayeh’s vibrant illustrations, make this heartwarming inter-generational story truly shine. Lola is dropped off by her parents to spend the summer with her grandmother. Their time together is full of creativity and fun, until Lola feels homesick. Theres a lot packed into this tender tale that celebrates a family’s love. The Postcard Project is a valuable social and emotional learning story, with a fun craft activity at the end.