"Be polite, otherwise I won't love you" – this is what ten-year-old Yarka most often heard from her mother. The woman gave birth to her very early and turned her upbringing into a barter, where you have to pay for food by obedience. Yarka lacks love, so the girl tries to find her in a fictional world. She sees abandoned twins and for the first time feels the call of care, an obsessive desire to become a mother that she never had. "The fifth boat" is a tragic story about how unwanted children grow up, who are ignored by their parents and traumatized by their expectations. This is not just a story about childhood, but a painful look into a familiar home where unconditional love is not enough. About the book There are homes where childhood smells of warmth and trust. And there are others — where love needs to be "earned", where silence hurts, and words become weapons. "The fifth boat" by Slovak writer Monika Companikova is a novel about just such a house. About a home that is hard to grow up in, but even harder to stay yourself. Twelve-year-old Yarka lives next door to her mother, who gave birth to her too early and did not learn to be an adult. There is no unconditional love in this world — only rules, barter, and the agonizing expectation of "right" behavior. In constant loneliness, the girl creates her own private reality, in which she herself can give care and warmth, build the family that she so lacks. "The fifth boat" is a heartfelt story about unwanted children growing up in the shadow of parental trauma, about the fragile inner world of a child who craves love above all else, and about the dangerous line between fantasy and reality. The novel exposes everyday cruelty, which society often does not notice, and at the same time shows the incredible ability of children to survive, invent, love and seek light even in the dark. This book leaves behind a long echo-painful, sincere and absolutely true. This is a text that touches the most vulnerable and speaks about what is silent. The publication will be of interest to a wide readership, especially connoisseurs of realistic prose and stories with social overtones.