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Summary
Summary
Getting kids to sleep isn't easy -- especially when there are games to be played -- in bedrooms everywhere, adults try their best -- (but so do kids).
Author Sally Cook teams up with New York Times best-selling illustrator Laura Cornell in this uproarious ode to parents who would do anything to get their kids to sleep -- and to kids who would do anything to make the task, well . . . challenging.
Reviews (5)
School Library Journal Review
PreS-Gr 3-Using just a few rhyming words that wind and wiggle their way across the pages in a variety of sizes and colors, this charming story will delight youngsters. Readers peek into a block of city apartments and find a diverse array of families heading to bed and trying to get their little ones to sleep in any way they can. When someone yells "Pillow fight!" things deteriorate rapidly, with kids hanging from their bunk beds, throwing their musical instruments out the window, and being calmed by exhausted, desperate adults. Hide-and-seek, asking for drinks and stories, and counting sheep finally give way to lights out, at which point somebody quietly asks, "Pillow fight?" Cornell's ink-and-watercolor cartoons work beautifully in scenes that range from close-ups to vignettes to detailed two-page paintings. The delightfully unique characters, dressed in wildly patterned pajamas and wearing an amazing array of expressions, seem to jump off the pages. The spread featuring a variety of parents in varying states of despair (begging, pulling out their hair, doing yoga, crying, standing on their head, and yelling) is particularly humorous. Although it probably won't lull anybody to sleep, Good Night Pillow Fight is a book that children and parents will want to enjoy together again and again.-Shelley B. Sutherland, Niles Public Library District, IL (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Publisher's Weekly Review
"Bedtime ritual" is a phrase that has diametrically opposed meanings for grownups and kids, muse debut picture book author Cook (Another Season) and Cornell (Tell Me Again About the Night I Was Born). In an homage of sorts to Rear Window, Cornell lets readers peep into the windows of a dozen or so apartment bedrooms, where parents are wooing their fractious children into dreamland with tactics that include a soft-shoe routine (performed by the dad in top hat and tails), yoga, a guitar serenade and even a secured closet to guard against monster attacks. "Good night," writes Cook with a firmness underscored by the solid-looking typography. "Pillow fight!" is the kids' rejoinder on the next spread, depicted in a burst of vignettes showing giddy free-for-alls. "Kiss my cheek," say all the grownups on the next page, which reverts to the apartment view (by now the top-hatted dad is playing a sax, the yoga mom dances to a tambourine, and the guitar has been chucked out the window). "Hide and seek!" respond the kids, secreting themselves in drawers, bookshelves, under sofa cushions and even behind the word "and." Emotions escalate on both sides, but authority and exhaustion finally win out over whining and stalling. The final spread is a tranquil urban nocturne, with every apartment window dark. The staccato text and Cornell's gift for wacky details and pint-size hysteria make this the perfect choice for diehard insomniacs-and the parents who try to remember that they love them. Ages 4-8. (May) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Horn Book Review
The nightly battle that is bedtime gets fresh treatment with a minimal, effective text and raucous illustrations of a city neighborhood. Parents' volleys (""Go to bed!"") are printed in blue, while the kids' rejoinders (""You haven't read!"") appear in red. Detailed watercolors reveal various families' individual styles and routines as glimpsed through their bedroom windows. (c) Copyright 2010. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted. All rights reserved.
Kirkus Review
A boisterous romp through bedtime ensues as children resist going to sleep. Manic, apartment-dwelling kids--wilder than those of Cornell's work with Jamie Lee Curtis--have an answer every time their parents try to coax them into bed: "Good night. / Pillow fight! / Kiss my cheek. / Hide and seek!" The brightly clad children explode off the pages as they holler and bounce upside down, their mouths sometimes taking up most of the page. Perhaps a story would do the trick? "Jack Sprat . . . / Not that! / Three Bears? / Who cares?" Some double pages show a clear view into all the apartment windows at once; on others, backgrounds disappear while the vibrant battle continues; two double spreads feature just forearms with fingers pointing. Cartoonishly exaggerated facial expressions and energetic rhymes forbid any hush-hush aura, but this may work perfectly for bedtime-resisters as well as group read-alouds. The end shows finally darkened windows but, delightfully, a child has the last (whispered) words. (Picture book. 2-5) Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
PreS. In lighted windows across a city, the universal bedtime battle rages. With just a few words per page, Cook's elemental rhymes toss familiar dialogue back and forth between beleaguered parents and giddy, defiant children: Good night. Pillow fight! In Cornell's scribbly paint-and-ink illustrations, rendered with irresistible detail and skewed angles, desperate parents cajole their offspring: a father in top hat and tails dances for his nonplussed son; a mother seated in lotus position tries meditation with her bug-eyed child. The children aren't falling for anything. Cornell's glorious spreads explode with grinning, frenzied kids charging about like heat-seeking missiles. Pleas for juice and stories finally escalate into a showdown: Go to BED! reads the large text below an image of a father's hand, authoritative finger pointed. You haven't READ! reads the text on the next spread, above a picture of a tiny, equally accusatory finger pointing right back. Eventually, everyone settles down, and sleepy dialogue drifts through a night sky until a tenuous quiet is broken by a last, weak Pillow fight? Cornell's illustrations beautifully capture the full range of emotions bedtime brings--the manic joy, the wild fatigue, and most of all the love--in this sly, exuberant view of a fundamental struggle that parents and children everywhere know. --Gillian Engberg Copyright 2004 Booklist
