After her 107-day voyage around the world helped her heal from profound loss and illness, Jill Siegal Chalsty was told by her doctors: “Whatever you’re doing, keep doing it!”

She took their words to heart. But her next journey would not be by sea—it would be by land. Leaving the ship behind, Jill set out on a summer drive across Europe, from Belfast to Berlin, carrying forward her mission: no child should have to face life’s challenges without the tools to navigate them.

Along the way, two very different couples become her companions, and one friendship quietly unravels. She stands at Checkpoint Charlie, now a tourist attraction; at Hitler’s bunker, now a parking lot; and beneath a tree where children who spend their childhoods as caregivers tie ribbons bearing their wishes. Everywhere she goes, one question follows her: How do we protect the future if we won’t learn from the past?

Written in real time and with unflinching honesty about her own missteps, Packets of Hope: A Wish for Every Child is less a travelogue than a reckoning—with loss, with prejudice, and with a mission Jill carries forward more urgently than ever.