Nya is annoyed that her younger sister, Akeer, is dragging her feet as they make the long walk to the water hole. Nya encourages her by singing and then playing the clapping game and they finally arrive and fill the jerry can. But Akeer is even slower on the way back, and Nya realizes the little girl is sick. There’s still a long way to go before they’re home and Nya can’t leave her sister alone, but carrying Akeer and the water is too heavy. She dumps half the water and picks up her sister. By setting one near goal after another (reaching the tamarind tree, then the thorn bushes, next the old stump), Nya perseveres, finally arriving back at the village and her mother. But the journey isn’t done, because now the family must walk to the clinic. Despite her exhaustion, Nya realizes she can go on, “As long as I go a step at a time.” The tension of the story is heightened by swirls of color in sun-baked shades of yellow, ocher, and brown, while concluding lines assure that Akeer is alright, adding that a well installed in the family’s village by Water for South Sudan promises to reduce water-born illness and free girls like Nya and Akeer to go to school. (Ages 4–8)

In this picture book companion to the beloved bestseller A Long Walk to Water, a young South Sudanese girl goes on a journey that requires determination, persistence, and compassion.

Young Nya takes little sister Akeer along on the two-hour walk to fetch water for the family. But Akeer becomes too ill to walk, and Nya faces the impossible: her sister and the full water vessel together are too heavy to carry.

As she struggles, she discovers that if she manages to take one step, then another, she can reach home and Mama's care.

Bold, impressionistic paintings by Caldecott and Coretta Scott King Honor winner Brian Pinkney evoke the dry, barren landscape and the tenderness between the two sisters.

An afterword discusses the process of providing clean water in South Sudan to reduce waterborne illness.