On a Summer Night

Starred review from February 19, 2024
Alternating between descriptive lines and reiterative questions, a second-person narrative voice puts the reader at the center of this taut story set on a still summer night. A child with sleep-rumpled hair is seen upright in bed, their bedroom window open: “All at once/ you sit up straight/ and rub your eyes.// What has woken you?” Mysterious stirrings continue as the child pads to the kitchen and encounters a cat (“Who has woken her? Was it you?”). Signature-style flat graphic spreads by Pak (Leo and Lea), in a palette of dusky plum, forest green, and toasted ivory, underscore the night’s velvety darkness as the child ventures outside, unafraid. A roused dog barks, a rabbit emerges from hiding, a tree’s leaves sway, and a breath of air moves. Evocative lines from Hopkinson (Cinderella and a Mouse Called Fred) ask who woke each, capturing them all at moments of quickening. Pak hints at what’s to come with small, crisp-edged intrusions of warm light that balance the book’s considerable suspense until a gentle presence finally materializes. It’s a luminous, intentionally paced work that captures a slow-moving encounter with the majestic dance of the natural world. Ages 3–5.

March 1, 2024
What is it that wakes up a child, a house cat, and other sleepers on a hot summer night? There's a subtle clue to the cause in Pak's dim, serene scenes as a brown-skinned child, limned in the thinnest hint of golden light, rises from bed and heads to the backyard to walk in dew-flecked grass, to feel the warm dirt against bare feet, and to gaze up at the night sky. Meanwhile a cat follows along, a small dog barks across the way, a rabbit peeks out from behind a bush--and opposite each scene, we see a page filled with a dark grayish-brown block of color that retreats as a pale wedge of color slowly expands. At last the sleepers all go back to their beds, a cloud passes in the sky, and the conundrum's answer washes in: "Bright, bright! / The light crosses the table, / climbs the stairs, / smooths the sheets / on your bed. / Mysterious, golden, / and round." The short, deliberate phrases of Hopkinson's verse and the simple illustrations with their subdued overall lighting combine to slow the nocturnal episode down to a properly and irresistibly snoozy pace. Spare, rhythmic, luminous...nighty night. (Picture book. 3-6)

COPYRIGHT(2024) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

March 1, 2024
In this quiet cumulative story, everyone -- and everything -- wakens, one by one. Who has woken the girl, the cat, the dog, the rabbit, the tree, the air, and the cloud? The reader and protagonist seek answers together, prodded by Hopkinson's hushed prose and direct address and Pak's full-bleed illustrations that switch between placing the reader in the protagonist's point of view and offering an omniscient perspective. Pak renders nighttime digitally in shades of purple and black with deep green landscapes and glowing accents that spotlight the sleep-depriving suspects. Throughout, words and art harmoniously convey nighttime magic. When Hopkinson writes, "Now a sweet ribbon of breath curls around you too," Pak depicts the girl grasping a wispy, textured "breath" of air. Drama builds with the refrain, "Was it you?" on cleverly designed spreads interspersed between the nocturnal scenes. Moonlight begins as a small corner of yellow in the bottom right of an otherwise solid purple spread, then progressively expands up and toward the verso on the next five pages, until finally, yellow moonlight overtakes the purple darkness. And then, in reverse order of their awakening, everyone returns to sleep as moonlight follows the girl upstairs and literally blankets her and her cat. In the final illustration, an all-yellow double-page spread reads, "Who has woken the moon?" A memorable celebration of nighttime activity and moonlit slumber. Shelley Isaacson

(Copyright 2024 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)

May 1, 2024
Preschool-Grade 2 Crafted in lovely second-person prose, this meditative bedtime story transports readers into a realm of ethereal tranquility reminiscent of comforting lullabies. The story is set against the backdrop of a young child's bedroom and then a starlit backyard, and the narrator invites ""you"" to explore the nocturnal habitat as a child wanders under the watchful gaze of the moon on a too-hot night. First, the narrator asks what's woken you; then they wonder the same of the cat, which the child encounters on the way toward the back door. Through the author's skillful use of language, readers are gently guided into a mindful observation of the natural world from the moment the child feels the dewy grass on their toes and continues as they take a moment at the garden patch. Along with the meditative language, the dusky purple backdrop to the scenes emphasizes the calm, quiet nighttime setting, which finds the child spreading ""arms wide as a scarecrow's"" and burying their feet in warm dirt before finally returning to bed. Quietly and calmly, this will resonate long after the final page.

COPYRIGHT(2024) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

June 14, 2024

PreS-Gr 2-In this charming and cumulative story, a young child who has brown skin seeks to find what has woken her in the middle of a seemingly silent summer night. After leaving her bedroom, the unnamed protagonist travels through the dark house, and passes her snoozing cat, who similarly wakes and follows her outside. Still trying to find the source of what stirred her, the child encounters a barking dog, silent rabbit, a rustling tree, moving air, and traveling cloud, all the while wondering what woke them from their slumber. As the child turns to go back to her room, the drowsy creatures all return to their dreams, before revealing the culprit: the bright and yellow moon. Hopkinson employs a winning combination of lilting, poetic second-person text filled with repetitive questions, while Pak's tranquil nocturnal spreads cleverly reveal the moon's responsibility throughout the story. Read with Natalie Ziarnik's A Lullaby of Summer Things or Stephen Savage's Moonlight for a perfect pairing of summer bedtime stories. VERDICT A sweet and serene seasonal story that will find a home in any collection.-Olivia Gorecke

Copyright 2024 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

January 1, 2024
In this quiet cumulative story, everyone -- and everything -- wakens, one by one. Who has woken the girl, the cat, the dog, the rabbit, the tree, the air, and the cloud? The reader and protagonist seek answers together, prodded by Hopkinson's hushed prose and direct address and Pak's full-bleed illustrations that switch between placing the reader in the protagonist's point of view and offering an omniscient perspective. Pak renders nighttime digitally in shades of purple and black with deep green landscapes and glowing accents that spotlight the sleep-depriving suspects. Throughout, words and art harmoniously convey nighttime magic. When Hopkinson writes, "Now a sweet ribbon of breath curls around you too," Pak depicts the girl grasping a wispy, textured "breath" of air. Drama builds with the refrain, "Was it you?" on cleverly designed spreads interspersed between the nocturnal scenes. Moonlight begins as a small corner of yellow in the bottom right of an otherwise solid purple spread, then progressively expands up and toward the verso on the next five pages, until finally, yellow moonlight overtakes the purple darkness. And then, in reverse order of their awakening, everyone returns to sleep as moonlight follows the girl upstairs and literally blankets her and her cat. In the final illustration, an all-yellow double-page spread reads, "Who has woken the moon?" A memorable celebration of nighttime activity and moonlit slumber.

(Copyright 2024 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)