Echo Come Home

Megan Rix's Echo Come Home is a heart-tugging dog story for 10 year olds about a deaf boy and the stray who might become his hearing dog.

What happens

Jake is eleven. He's had severe hearing loss in both ears since he had meningitis at five. At his new school there's nobody to repeat what the teacher says, so at break he stands by the railings on his own.

When his class has to write down a wish, Jake doesn't have to think. He wants a dog.

Across town, a scruffy little terrier cross is living on the streets. He sleeps under a crumbling bridge with an old homeless man called George, and half the takeaways in town slip him chips and noodles. But he won't let anyone stroke him, and nobody knows why.

When the dog warden finally catches him, he escapes from his crate. Then he escapes from his kennel and eats the visitors' shortbread (you have to admire him). Lenny from Helper Dogs thinks this clever little stray could be trained to listen for sounds.

And then he jumps out of Lenny's van, looks straight at Jake and lets him stroke him. Jake names him Echo.

The chapters switch between Jake and the dog, so you get both sides. Jake's chapters are really good at showing what being deaf is like day to day. P and B look almost the same on people's lips. The dinner hall is one giant roar. The whistling and hissing of tinnitus keeps him awake at night.

It's never preachy about any of it. It just lets you stand next to Jake for a while. The moment he gets to call a boy from his class a "friend from school" is a real lump-in-the-throat one.

Later on, the two of them get split up and Echo has to make the trip back to Jake on his own. That's the adventure the title is talking about.

Who hasn't wished for a dog at some point? If your reader has, or if they know what it's like to feel left out, this one will probably go straight to their heart.

What to read next

Megan Rix has more stories about dogs and the children who love them, and The Great Escape is a lovely one to try next. It's 1939 and Robert and Lucy are being evacuated to Devon, which means Buster the Jack Russell, Rose the collie and Tiger the cat have to stay behind in London.