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THE DREAMS I'LL DREAM TONIGHT

Name: THE DREAMS I'LL DREAM TONIGHT
Author: Sarah Ruhl
ISBN: 9781534453296

by Sarah Ruhl ; illustrated by Sally Deng ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 22, 2025

A very welcome addition to the bedtime-story canon.

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Two-time Pulitzer finalist Ruhl offers youngsters a playbook for a good night’s sleep.

In text addressed to a parent, a child offers ideas for warding off unpleasant dreams and enjoying good ones. The youngster proposes that the parent “read just one more book to me the way you always do. Then I won’t dream of dragons. Instead, I’ll dream of you.” Smart kid. In fact, this child already seems to know how to conjure up agreeable nighttime images: “Tonight I won’t have nightmares. No bad dreams for me. Instead, I’m going to dream about a hippo sipping tea.” Throughout this soothing narrative, the protagonist delivers reassuring ideas, expressed via bouncy, rhythmic verses that evoke genial, sometimes comical reveries. Importantly, the child demonstrates an ability to conquer images that might otherwise prove fearsome: “And I won’t dream of monsters hiding by that chair. That monster was a kitten—his tail was in the air!” At one point, the child decides to “choose to dream about…a dream inside a dream”—an empowering statement indeed. As morning peeps through the window, the young narrator slips off to sleep, saying, “I’m going to dream about…” This sweet book will help embolden dreamers to overcome nighttime apprehensions; kids will welcome repeat readings. Employing crayonlike textures and eye-catching imagery, the soft, muted illustrations match the text perfectly. Parent and child are pale-skinned.

A very welcome addition to the bedtime-story canon. (page for readers to write their own dreams) (Picture book. 3-7)

Pub Date: July 22, 2025

ISBN: 9781534453296

Page Count: 40

Publisher: Simon & Schuster

Review Posted Online: March 8, 2025

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2025

Categories:

CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES

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CARPENTER'S HELPER

by Sybil Rosen ; illustrated by Camille Garoche ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 16, 2021

Renata’s wren encounter proves magical, one most children could only wish to experience outside of this lovely story.

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A home-renovation project is interrupted by a family of wrens, allowing a young girl an up-close glimpse of nature.

Renata and her father enjoy working on upgrading their bathroom, installing a clawfoot bathtub, and cutting a space for a new window. One warm night, after Papi leaves the window space open, two wrens begin making a nest in the bathroom. Rather than seeing it as an unfortunate delay of their project, Renata and Papi decide to let the avian carpenters continue their work. Renata witnesses the birth of four chicks as their rosy eggs split open “like coats that are suddenly too small.” Renata finds at a crucial moment that she can help the chicks learn to fly, even with the bittersweet knowledge that it will only hasten their exits from her life. Rosen uses lively language and well-chosen details to move the story of the baby birds forward. The text suggests the strong bond built by this Afro-Latinx father and daughter with their ongoing project without needing to point it out explicitly, a light touch in a picture book full of delicate, well-drawn moments and precise wording. Garoche’s drawings are impressively detailed, from the nest’s many small bits to the developing first feathers on the chicks and the wall smudges and exposed wiring of the renovation. (This book was reviewed digitally with 10-by-20-inch double-page spreads viewed at actual size.)

Renata’s wren encounter proves magical, one most children could only wish to experience outside of this lovely story. (Picture book. 3-7)

Pub Date: March 16, 2021

ISBN: 978-0-593-12320-1

Page Count: 40

Publisher: Schwartz & Wade/Random

Review Posted Online: Jan. 12, 2021

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2021

Categories:

CHILDREN'S ANIMALS | CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES | CHILDREN'S FAMILY

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ON THE FIRST DAY OF KINDERGARTEN

by Tish Rabe ; illustrated by Laura Hughes ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 21, 2016

While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of...

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Rabe follows a young girl through her first 12 days of kindergarten in this book based on the familiar Christmas carol.

The typical firsts of school are here: riding the bus, making friends, sliding on the playground slide, counting, sorting shapes, laughing at lunch, painting, singing, reading, running, jumping rope, and going on a field trip. While the days are given ordinal numbers, the song skips the cardinal numbers in the verses, and the rhythm is sometimes off: “On the second day of kindergarten / I thought it was so cool / making lots of friends / and riding the bus to my school!” The narrator is a white brunette who wears either a tunic or a dress each day, making her pretty easy to differentiate from her classmates, a nice mix in terms of race; two students even sport glasses. The children in the ink, paint, and collage digital spreads show a variety of emotions, but most are happy to be at school, and the surroundings will be familiar to those who have made an orientation visit to their own schools.

While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of Kindergarten (2003), it basically gets the job done. (Picture book. 4-7)