Animal Lullabies - Hardcover

Conrad, Pam

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0060247185 ISBN 13: 9780060247188

Publisher: Harpercollins Childrens Books, 1997

Synopsis

Mama Owl awakens her young as Mother Swan glides around the pond to put her babies to sleep, in a charming brightly illustrated collection of lullabies for young children.

About this title

Reviews

Grade 2-4?Ten animals use words of reassurance as nighttime envelops their habitat. A giraffe croons to her nephew, "Be still, my sweetheart,/your momma's on her way." An alligator warns potential predators, "Stay away now or I'll eat you alive!" A prairie dog whispers, "Hush, it's only darkness./Hush, it's just the wind." Cowdrey's lovely, dreamlike illustrations will draw readers to this book, but the poems have sometimes jarring, less-than-lyrical lines. An inviting drawing of a starfish and an oyster scraping the ocean floor is matched with this opening phrase: "The sea is deep and dark at night./Clat. Clat. Clatty dunk./Time to close up tight." On the other hand, the final selection, "Owl's Lullaby to Her Daughter," perfectly matches the comforting portrait of mother owl waking her sleeping owlet for a nighttime rendezvous. All in all, the poems vary in effectiveness while Cowdrey's dark-toned watercolors are uniformly arresting.?Barbara McGinn, Oak Hill Elementary School, Severna Park, MD
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Various adult creatures--among them, prairie dogs, oysters, beavers, crocodiles--sing their children to sleep in their own particular styles. The swan's lullaby (to ``swanlings'' instead of cygnets) is smooth and mesmerizing, the giraffe is quietly reassuring. Some of the others are downright noisy: The mother beaver calls her babies home with a ``SLAP! SLAP! WHACKUM!'' of her tail, and the mother crocodile threatens to eat intruders alive in ``Alligator Lullaby.'' In a final twist, the owl mother gently sings her daughter awake. Cowdrey sets the mood with midnight blue endpapers spangled with stars and a crescent moon. His stylized illustrations present the animals from a variety of interesting angles. Many of the illustrations appear to be silvered by moonlight, and the book has a pleasant design with framed full-page illustrations facing text printed on blocks of shaded color. For purists, occasional inconsistencies detract from the whole--the name of baby swans, for example, or the chimpanzees in the picture that accompanies ``Monkey Lullaby.'' Overall, though, it's a very pleasant bedtime book. (Picture book. 3-7) -- Copyright ©1997, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Edition details

• Publisher: Harpercollins Childrens Books
• Publication date: 1997
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0060247185
• ISBN 13: 9780060247188
• Binding: Hardcover
• Illustrator: Cowdrey Richard
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 32