Tuesday, April 22, 2008

New Baby Shower Favorite

In a Blue Room
by Jim Averbeck
illustrated by Tricia Tusa
Harcourt Children's Books, 2008
review copy compliments of the publisher



I've never had the joy nor the frustration of coaxing a child into sleep. Never raised one from the ground up, as it were. I have chosen to work with 9 and 10 year olds during the daylight hours of their 4th grade year of school. I leave all the rest of the hours of every day to their parents and the rest of the years of their school lives to teachers with more patience for tots and/or teens than I have been dealt.

That said, I do love to give books at baby showers that I hope are destined to become sleep time favorites -- usually Mem Fox's Time For Bed, or the old standard, Good Night Moon.

In a Blue Moon is my new baby shower favorite. Slowly and gently, page by page, Mama settles Alice until it's time for the light to be shut off and the room to turn blue in the pale light of the moon. The book begins with Alice jumping on her bed and ends at a whisper with only a few words on each page. The book is what it needs to do -- soothing, quieting, calming. I daresay Mama is feeling much better by the end as well.


*****
Author interview at Tales From the Rushmore Kid
Reviews at ShelfElf, and 7-Imp.

3 comments:

  1. Darn IT all to heck! I was just going to post about how this book makes a perfect baby gift! Oh well, I am still going to do it, but...
    My sister is having twins this summer and as soon as I finished reading it, I gave it to her and said here is Baby's (ies?) first book from Auntie Megan.
    GREAT LITTLE BOOK!

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  2. Anonymous9:34 PM

    You're right. That'd be a great baby shower gift. Anything's better than what's usually given: That I'll Love You Forever schlock. (Sorry, hope you're not a fan!)

    This is one of my favorite PBs this year! WOOT!

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  3. Anonymous11:00 AM

    I still haven't read this and I'm going to rectify that TODAY. Hello, bookstore....
    Thanks for the nudge...

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