A SOUND LIKE SOMEONE TRYING NOT TO MAKE A SOUND

Fears and fantasies fill the mind of a small boy who wakes to unfamiliar sounds in the night in this tale excerpted from Irving’s A Widow for One Year. When he fails to awaken Tim, his sleeping younger brother, Tom calls upon his father to investigate the strange sounds he describes as a “monster with no arms and legs” that “slides on its fur” and “pulls itself along on its teeth.” Suspense builds as Tom searches the dark house for the nameless monster, which his father anti-climatically identifies as “just a mouse crawling between the walls.” But by this time, Tim is awake, left to wonder about the crawling mouse. Hazy pencil drawings in muted blues, grays, and greens surround pajama-clad Tom in shadows, wordlessly intensifying the mood of nocturnal fear. Perfect for anyone who fears things that go bump in the night. (Picture book. 4-7)