When Dawn Stole the Dark - Hardcover

Joerg, Donna

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0965301818 ISBN 13: 9780965301817

Publisher: Cadence Pr, 1997

Synopsis

When a little girl is afraid of the dark, her mother explains that all the monsters she fears come from her own mind, and so she can use her imagination to turn them into friends

About this title

Review:

Fear of the dark is a subject that's been tackled over and over again. Nothing new is revealed with this rhyming text which has mother come help the child, "Hannah, see that monsters in the night are only as scary as we make them." An idea repeated throughout is, "You can't chase away what's not truly there." Also repeated are references to thieves in the night which by many could be seen as too real a threat to be tossed around so lightly. Here, the creatures that come to invade Hannah's room, mainly ordinary animals- tigers, lizards and a crow plus a few ghostly spooks - are turned into playmates, until she wishes them away. The benign illustrations support this positive viewpoint. Even when Hannah is afraid, the watercolor and pencil drawings lean toward the comical causing no sense of alarm in the reader. The author spends at least one third of her book setting up the core situation of the story with rhymes that feel either clunky or extraneous. Once Mama comes to Hannah's aid, the book progresses more smoothly. At times the illustrations also have a chunky feel. When the artist applies her black highlighting pencil too heavily she interrupts the flow of the watercolors causing her characters to become static. While fear of the dark is a subject of much concern to children, the treatment here is ordinary and ultimately uneven. -- From Independent Publisher

From School Library Journal:

PreSchool-Grade 1?With the help of an understanding mother, Hannah overcomes her fear of the dark. Rather than hiding from the imagined lizards, tigers, and creepers that populate her room at night, the child learns to transform the creatures into playmates. The use of couplets forces the slight tale into an unvarying rhythm with predictable rhymes that quickly grow tiresome. Benedict does a fine job of depicting stuffed animals and an adequate job of portraying the nighttime visitors. With the human characters, she is less successful, particularly in capturing facial expressions. Together text and illustrations offer a less-than-convincing tribute to the power of positive thinking.?Kathy Piehl, Mankato State University, MN
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Cadence Pr
• Publication date: 1997
• ISBN 10: 0965301818
• ISBN 13: 9780965301817
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 29
• Illustrator: Benedict Judith Ann