Goodnight Already!

Reviewed by: Cidney Mayes - Wells Public Library, Wells, Southern Maine Library District

Review Date: August 11, 2015

Review

Duck is simply full of energy, while his next door neighbor Bear just wants to go to sleep. Duck's brightly colored pages featuring yellows and reds are juxtaposed against Bear's dark, blue toned ones, creating interesting contrast between simple and effective illustrations. Duck pesters Bear, asking him to do a variety of activities including playing cards and making smoothies. After a series of suggestions, Bear refuses and the titular phrase "goodnight already" is voiced by one of the characters. This scenario repeats three times, and finally ends with Bear wide-awake in his kitchen making cookies, while Duck has drifted off to sleep while reading a book. Emotive character expressions, silly costumes, and the repetitive nature of the text lends itself well to read alouds, but the simplistic plot does not encourage rereads. A fun addition to school and public library storytimes.

Overall Book Score: very good