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DOZY BEAR AND THE SECRET OF SLEEP

Name: DOZY BEAR AND THE SECRET OF SLEEP
Author: Katie Blackburn
ISBN: 978-0-06-256426-9

by Katie Blackburn ; illustrated by Richard Smythe ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 28, 2017

Just as purposive as the runaway bestseller but significantly more palatable.

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Following on the unearned success of Carl-Johan Forssén Ehrlin’s The Rabbit Who Wants to Fall Asleep (2015), a slightly more artful take on the same relaxation techniques.

Dozy Bear crawls into his den every night, thinks of all the other animals who are fast asleep, but evidently cannot fall asleep himself. Dozy’s family coaxes him in turn to somnolence. Mama tells him to close his eyes and “snuggle down”; Papa takes him through a physical relaxation sequence; Nana impresses on him how soft his bed is; and Grampy tells him to listen to the quiet of the night. Certain key words are italicized, cuing adult readers to emphasize them: “He’d think of all the other / animals, fast asleep….” Variations on the word “sleep” appear some 30 times, along with other suggestive words such as “snoring,” “settle,” and “stillness.” Dozy’s mama leads him through some deep breathing (“Deep, long breaths, innn—and—ouuuuuut, / innn—and—ouuuuuut, innn—and—ouuuuuut”), which finally renders Dozy “a little bundle of sleep.” Smythe’s twilight-colored collage illustrations look as though they’ve been tinted with watercolor and then scribbled over with crayon, giving them a childlike feel. Poor composition and the choice to make Dozy and his family virtually indistinguishable from one another result in some illustrations that will puzzle readers who haven’t already conked out.

Just as purposive as the runaway bestseller but significantly more palatable. (Picture book. 2-5)

Pub Date: March 28, 2017

ISBN: 978-0-06-256426-9

Page Count: 32

Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins

Review Posted Online: Jan. 16, 2017

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2017

Categories:

CHILDREN'S ANIMALS

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A KISSING HAND FOR CHESTER RACCOON

From the Kissing Hand series

by Audrey Penn ; illustrated by Barbara L. Gibson ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 1, 2014

Parents of toddlers starting school or day care should seek separation-anxiety remedies elsewhere, and fans of the original...

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A sweetened, condensed version of the best-selling picture book, The Kissing Hand.

As in the original, Chester Raccoon is nervous about attending Owl’s night school (raccoons are nocturnal). His mom kisses him on the paw and reminds him, “With a Kissing Hand… / We’ll never be apart.” The text boils the story down to its key elements, causing this version to feel rushed. Gone is the list of fun things Chester will get to do at school. Fans of the original may be disappointed that this board edition uses a different illustrator. Gibson’s work is equally sentimental, but her renderings are stiff and flat in comparison to the watercolors of Harper and Leak. Very young readers will probably not understand that Owl’s tree, filled with opossums, a squirrel, a chipmunk and others, is supposed to be a school.

Parents of toddlers starting school or day care should seek separation-anxiety remedies elsewhere, and fans of the original shouldn’t look to this version as replacement for their page-worn copies. (Board book. 2-4)

Pub Date: April 1, 2014

ISBN: 978-1-933718-77-4

Page Count: 14

Publisher: Tanglewood Publishing

Review Posted Online: May 18, 2014

Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2014

Categories:

CHILDREN'S ANIMALS | CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES

- BOOK REVIEW
CHESTER RACCOON AND THE ALMOST PERFECT SLEEPOVER
by Audrey Penn ; illustrated by Barbara L. Gibson

- BOOK REVIEW
KAI TO THE RESCUE!
by Audrey Penn ; illustrated by Mike Yamada

- BOOK REVIEW
A COLOR GAME FOR CHESTER RACCOON
by Audrey Penn & illustrated by Barbara L. Gibson

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FIVE BLACK CATS

by Patricia Hegarty ; illustrated by Julia Woolf ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 1, 2013

For toddlers unafraid of typical Halloween imagery.

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A troop of cats traverse a spooky landscape as they make their way to a party hosted by ghosts.

Each double-page spread shows the felines’ encounters with the likes of an owl, jack-o’-lanterns or a bat. One or two of these creepy meetings may be too abstract for the youngest readers, as the cats hear eerie noises with no discernible source on the page. The text, which consists of one rhyming couplet per scene, mostly scans despite a couple of wobbles: “Five black cats get a bit of a scare / As the flip-flapping wings of a bat fill the air.” The sleek, slightly retro art, likely created using a computer, depicts the cats cavorting at night through a shadowy cityscape, the countryside and a haunted house; they may scare some toddlers and delight others. A brighter color palette would have given the project a friendlier, more universal appeal. Luckily, the well-lit, final party scene provides a playful conclusion.

For toddlers unafraid of typical Halloween imagery. (Board book. 2-4)