Journey of the Midnight Sun by Shazia Afzal

Journey of the Midnight Sun
by Shazia Afzal, illustrated by Aliya Ghare
Orca Books Publishers

A beautiful picture book based on the true story of the Midnight Sun Mosque that traveled 4,000 kilometers across Canada to become one of the most northern mosques in the Arctic Circle.

This is the true story of the journey of the Midnight Sun Mosque.

In 2010 a Winnipeg-based charity raised funds to build and ship a mosque to Inuvik, one of the most northern towns in Canada’s Arctic. A small but growing Muslim community there had been using a cramped trailer for their services, but there just wasn’t enough space. The mosque travelled over 4,000 kilometers on a journey fraught with poor weather, incomplete bridges, narrow roads, low traffic wires and a deadline to get on the last barge heading up the Mackenzie River before the first winter freeze. But it made it just in time and is now one of the most northern mosques in the world.

This beautiful picture book reminds us that the collective dream of fostering a multicultural and tolerant Canada exists and that people of all backgrounds will come together to build bridges and overcome obstacles for the greater good of their neighbors.