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Book: Yeti, Turn Out the Light!
Author: Greg Long & Chris Edmundson
Illustrator: Wednesday Kirwan
Pages: 36
Age Range: 3-5

Yeti, Turn Out the Light! gives a very light touch to the issue of kids who are afraid of shadows in their rooms. Yeti is sleepy. He gets ready for bed, but once in bed he tosses and turns because he is frightened of odd shadows in his room. The odd shadows are each shown, in various page spreads, to be something completely harmless (but odd enough to generate a suspicious shadow). Three bunnies, a deer with three birds on its antlers, an owl sitting on a bear's head, drinking some tea. I each case, the shadow is quite frightening, while the reality is quirky but not at all scary. In the end, Yeti is able to send all of his shadow-generating friends home, and get a good night of sleep. 

The rhyming text of Yeti, Turn Out the Light! is catchy and also demonstrates apt vocabulary. This is a book that I can imagine happily reading to my daughter over and over again. Here are a couple of examples:

"So Yeti heads home, eats his dinner, and flosses.
Then he snuggles into bed, but he turns and he tosses."

"Why?" you may ask.
Well I'll tell you, my dear.
Yeti sees shadows 
dart rightfully near."

I love a book that can use "dart." Another example uses "wary" to rhyme with "scary." Well-done, I say. 

Kirwan's digitally generated images feature a not-so-attractive blue and white Yeti figure. The various animal creatures that Yeti discovers in his house have huge, jewel-like eyes, and an exaggerated sweetness that provides contrast with the homely Yeti. The shadows are masterful, managing to look menacing, despite fitting in well with their ordinary shadow-generators.

The whole story is contrived, of course. Why would there be a deer with three birds on its antlers sneaking into Yeti's house in the middle of the night? But it's that very absurdity that I think will make this book work with shadow-leery preschoolers. Yeti, Turn Out the Light! is the opposite of a didactic book that tells kids not to be scared of shadows. Instead, Yeti shows kids, repeatedly and humorously, that the shadows might well be something benign. I am looking forward to trying this book out on my own preschooler. I expect it to find a place in our regular night-time picture book rotation. Recommended for home and library use. 

Publisher: Chronicle Books 
Publication Date: August 27, 2013
Source of Book: Review copy from the publisher

FTC Required Disclosure:

This site is an Amazon affiliate, and purchases made through Amazon links (including linked book covers) may result in my receiving a small commission (at no additional cost to you).

© 2014 by Jennifer Robinson of Jen Robinson's Book Page. All rights reserved. You can also follow me @JensBookPage or at my Growing Bookworms page on Facebook. 

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Book: Bedtime Monsters
Author: Josh Schneider
Pages: 32
Age Range: 4-8

Bedtime Monsters is a new picture book by Josh Schneider, who won a 2012 Theodor Seuss Geisel Award for Tales for Very Picky Eaters. Bedtime Monsters is a fun story about using your imagination to conquer nighttime fears.

By day, Arnold pretends to be a New York-destroying, animal-eating monster. But when bedtime comes around, he worries about "the monster that comes out at night and bits off toes." His pragmatic mother says: "I'm sure he's just as scared of you as you are of him." Arnold is then visited by a series of monsters, each of whom is afraid of the next, right up until his mother's supposition proves to be indirectly true.

Bedtime Monsters is written with short, declarative sentences that lend themselves to a suspenseful tone. Schneider uses carefully selected vocabulary words to make the sounds of the night come alive. Like this:

"Arnold and the terrible toe biter looked into the dark.
Arnold looked to the left.
The terrible toe biter looked to the right.
The bed made a squeaking noise.
The radiator made a glinking noise.
The closet door made a creaking noise."

There is plenty of dialog, which I think also helps to make it a fun read-aloud (parents can do monster voices). The monsters have creative names like "winged fargles." 

Schneider's watercolor, pen-and-ink, and colored pencil illustrations show Arnold's early pretendings via sketched outlines of the pretended elements surrounding the real elements (e.g. Arnold, with the outline of a monster around him). The monsters who visit Arnold, however, are shown as fully colored, three-dimensional creatures, supporting the conceit that the visits from the monsters are real. This works well, because it makes Bedtime Monsters into a straight-up story, and leaves any message about conquering one's fears in the background where it belongs. There's a humorous bit at the end where we see the last monster pretending to be Arnold. 

Striped PJ-clad Arnold shows a range of emotions, ranging from afraid to annoyed to proud, via both facial expression and posture. His nighttime room is shown with a twilight purple background, against which the monsters stand out clearly. 

I see Bedtime Monsters being popular with kids who are afraid of the dark, as well as with kids who like playing monster (are there any who don't?). As an adult reader, I like the subtlety of the message, and the way "he's more afraid of you than you are of him" plays out slowly over the course of the book. I also like the matter-of-fact authority of the mother (if only it were really that easy), and the general sense of fun of the text. Recommended for home and library purchase.  

Publisher: Clarion Books (@hmhkids) 
Publication Date: October 22, 2013
Source of Book: Review copy from the publisher

FTC Required Disclosure:

This site is an Amazon affiliate, and purchases made through Amazon links (including linked book covers) may result in my receiving a small commission (at no additional cost to you).

© 2013 by Jennifer Robinson of Jen Robinson's Book Page. All rights reserved. You can also follow me @JensBookPage or at my Growing Bookworms page on Facebook. 

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