Diurnal animals and their nocturnal counterparts exchange places as the sun goes down in this murmurous essay in natural history. Kudlinski links each pair with its common food: “Good night, Goshawk. / Your daytime turn is over. / You searched the meadows for mice all day. / Fluff your fine feathers, and sleep. / Rise and shine, Screech Owl. / The moon is drifting up in the tree. / Flap your silent wings and go about your mouse search.” Burnett follows the author’s lead in shadowy paintings, placing each predator within a semicircular frame, and filling the margins beyond with the flora or fauna that occupy the food chain’s next step down. Despite a too-sudden transition from dusk to dawn at the end, this sleepy-time read is as informative as it is somniferous for young listeners. A good pairing with Deborah Lee Rose’s One Nighttime Sea: An Ocean Counting Rhyme (2003), illustrated by Steve Jenkins, or its alphabetic predecessor. (Picture book/nonfiction. 5-8)
