Tuesday Storytime: Nighttime Noises

I'd been holding on to Bear Feels Scared since October when I didn't manage to fit it into the Halloween roster, so I snagged a couple of other "scary nighttime" books to offer a creepy-but-reassuring night-time themed storytime.

Creatures of the Night
Stephen Brooks, illustrated by Rodger Wilson
ISBN:  9780976901716
A catalog of the various animals that live nocturnally, with very little plotline.

I started out on this one because it's a straight call-and-response with the kids.  I flip the pages and they tell me what animal that is, and they all feel very competent and smart and adult.  The animals are a straightforward bunch, and the artwork isn't much past competent, but it flows smoothly and reads easily.  If it werent for bookending the scary part, I would have put this one in the middle because of the length and speed of reading.

Bear Feels Scared
Karma Wilson, illustrated by Jane Chapman
ISBN:  9780689859861
Bear stays out a bit late as a storm blows in, and gets disoriented and scared in the dark.  Friends rush to help out.

This one spends most of the time on the bear's big feelings of being scared and lost and worried, interspersed with bear's animal friends searching.  The comforting ending is a bit pat and quick, but no-one cried on me, which is what I worried about.

The Night World
Mordecai Gerstein
ISBN: 9780316188227
A boy is wakened by his cat and they venture through the dark of pre-dawn outside to see animals and plants in a strange new way.

This is a beautiful book and I really wish it didn't start off with practically three spreads of wordlessness.  That's just a rough hurdle for a storytime book, and while the payoff of the book is worth it, it does make for a challenge to the storyteller.  The boy and the cat wander through a confusing-dark house, where familiar objects seem odd and out of place, into a dark yard where plants and flowers are strange without color from the sunlight.  The animals begin to get excited about an upcoming event, and when the nighttime animals begin to leave, the astute reader realizes the sun is rising, as the skyline changes from blackness to greys to beautiful sunrise colors and sky blue.  Very pretty, and strangely-powerfully done considering the slim concept.