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Summary
Summary
Edmond, an expert at pompoms and jam, is content, though lonely, until Owl knocks on his door and everything changes.
In Edmond, The Moonlit Party , Edmond the squirrel is shy and a bit lonely, but he nevertheless believes that his life is just as it should be. He's happy making his colorful pompoms, stirring his nut jam, and going to sleep early. But one evening, when there's once again a party in his apartment house tree, the fragrance of his jam brings an unexpected visitor to his door. With the entrance of Owl, an aficionado of disguises and fun, into his life, everything begins to change for Edmond. Not only does he agree to attend Owl's party. He goes and has the best evening ever, and the world seems deeper and more wonderful than ever before, and just right, too!
Awash with rich color and the funniest, liveliest details ever, Edmond, The Moonlit Party is thoughtful and thought provoking as well as just plain fun! Each page deepens the story while providing a rich serving of visual pleasure!
Author Notes
Astrid Desbordes lives in Paris, where she works as an editor and an author. She received her degree in philosophy and has written several books on religion and philosophy for adults, but she also writes rich and unusual stories for children. Her first book to be published in the US (also by Enchanted Lion) was Daydreams of A Solitary Hamster , a clever and absolutely charming riff on Rousseau for young readers.
Marc Boutavant is an award-winning author and illustrator. For years, Boutavant has drawn for picture books and comics, and he's done his fair share of editorial illustration as well. His cartoons and picture books have made him a widely sought after illustrator. Boutavant's lively, expressive, and inventive illustrations appeal to both children and their parents, for they are simple and complex, witty, playful, and probing all at the same time. Ghosts , another Boutavant treat, is also published by Enchanted Lion Books.
Reviews (6)
Publisher's Weekly Review
Desbordes revisits themes from her 2010 picture book, Daydreams of a Solitary Hamster, as she explores the eccentricities of three animals that live in a chestnut tree. Readers first meet Edmond, a lonely orange-red squirrel who generally stays at home making nut jam and fuzzy pompom hats. Elsewhere in the tree live George, an owl who loves to disguise himself as other animals, and Harry, a bear known for throwing can't-miss parties. When the night of Harry's latest party arrives, the highlight of which is a "nothing tart" he has baked, George persuades Edmond to attend. Boutavant's eyeball-searing backgrounds in bright blues, yellows, and oranges can be a bit intense at first, but his characteristically retro-styled scenes exude homespun fun, especially as costumed animals dance and cavort at Harry's party. There are some odd digressions and musings-at the party, an ant asks a seagull (who is actually George in disguise) "what the vast emptiness of sea and sky is like"-but readers will still walk away understanding the value in breaking out of one's routines. Ages 4-8. (July) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Horn Book Review
Shy squirrel Edmond lives in a tree trunk making jam and pompoms. Owl George lives above Edmond; Harry the bear lives below. When Harry throws a party, George encourages Edmond to venture out of his house, and Edmond discovers there's more than just jam and pompoms that suits him. Bright, retro-style illustrations give Edmond an energetic air in this odd French import. (c) Copyright 2016. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Booklist Review
A shy red squirrel is coaxed out of his shell by his friendly, tree-dwelling neighbors. Edmond, who may just be related to Mélanie Watt's Scaredy Squirrel, likes staying safely at home making pom-poms and nut jam. Mr. George Owl, who lives above, loves exploring outside and collecting materials to make costumes. Harry, the bear downstairs, is the host with the most and throws fabulous parties for all the forest animals. On the night of one such party, Edmond wants desperately to attend but just can't work up the courage. Enter gregarious George, who insists that Edmond must come and dance at the party. Together, George (now dressed as a seagull) and Edmond (in his finest pom-pom hat) have a wonderful time with Harry and the other guests. The electric-colored, retro illustrations are a pure delight, full of charming details that beg to be revisited. Almost everyone has experienced some sort of social anxiety, and Edmond's transformation through friendship will come as an encouraging comfort to those who need it.--Mazza, April Copyright 2015 Booklist
New York Review of Books Review
In four picture books, the evening gives rise to dreams and the urge to explore shadowy worlds. EDMOND: THE MOONLIT PARTY By Astrid Desbordes Illustrated by Marc Boutavant 32 pp. Enchanted Lion Books. $17.95. (Ages 4 to 8) THE NIGHT WORLD Written and illustrated by Mordicai Gerstein 40 pp. Little, Brown & Company. $18. (Ages 3 to 6) BLACK AND WHITE Written and illustrated by Dahlov Ipcar 40 pp. Flying Eye Books. $17.95. (Ages 3 to 7) TELL ME WHAT TO DREAM ABOUT Written and illustrated by Giselle Potter 40 pp. Schwartz & Wade Books. $17.99. (Ages 3 to 7) THE NIGHT, as a fervent lyric made famous by Patti Smith implies, may not belong to preschoolers. But it is nonetheless a time - and mystery-laden phenomenon - that fascinates all young children, and arouses fear in many. From the ritualized consolations of "Goodnight Moon" to the antic rebellion of "In the Night Kitchen," picture books have charted countless courses through the dark. The tradition continues in three new books and one notable reissue. "Edmond: The Moonlit Party" starts off, auspiciously, with three sharply drawn, idiosyncratic animal characters who live as neighbors in an old chestnut tree. Edmond, the diffident stay-at-home squirrel, makes nut jam, devours adventure stories and spends "his evenings making pompoms." Mr. George Owl plays dress-up, and gregarious Harry the bear throws late-night dance parties. The reader is led to wonder: When party time next rolls around, will Edmond join in the fun? The French writer Astrid Desbordes adores her quirky characters, and her enthusiasm is contagious. She notes with admiration the care with which George stores his costumes and the time it takes Edmond to complete one of his "magnificent" pompom hats. Details like these firm up and anchor a story, especially one tailored for younger children, in whom concrete thought still predominates. So it feels like a momentary wrong turn toward the abstract when Harry announces his intention to serve a "nothing tart" at his next party (a what?); and again when George, sounding like an owlish existentialist, muses on the seagull's carefree "life of wind and waves." The illustrator, Marc Boutavant, who is also from France, does a better job of keeping the three-some's escapades grounded in specifics. His exuberant, balloon-bright graphics - a stylish retro-Pop brew with winsome notes of Takashi Murakami and Richard Scarry - set a party mood long before shy Edmond decides the time has finally come for him to step out onto the dance floor. While the night sky serves as a backdrop to Edmond's awakening, the transformative power of darkness is key in Mordicai Gerstein's "The Night World." A house cat rouses a little boy from bed for a late-night ramble. Together they make their way through darkened interiors and out into the front yard. What to the boy has long been familiar territory now looks and feels both exciting and strange. "Are these shadows roses?" the boy wonders. "That shadow is a deer." Painting in a subtly modulated palette of grays and blacks, Gerstein, who won the 2004 Caldecott Medal for "The Man Who Walked Between the Towers," offers readers a kind of night-vision-goggles view of a child's absorbing adventure in perception. In perhaps the most remarkable illustration, Gerstein freeze-frames a moment just before dawn as color seeps back into the world. We glimpse a frenzied scene of scurrying raccoons, birds and other nocturnal wildlife, all mixed up in a gorgeous tangle of light and shadow. For Gerstein, an old-fashioned Romantic, wonder lies everywhere for those prepared to see it, and wide-eyed 4- and 5-year-olds look to be among the prime candidates. Gerstein's fable unfolds as a kind of waking dream. But in Dahlov Ipcar's "Black and White," real dreams are made visible: the dreams, as it happens, of two frisky, elegant-looking dogs - one black, the other white. A clever plot twist doubles as an inspired metaphor for the dogs' friendship: Their strikingly similar dreams feature a variety of animals with black-and-white coloration that combines their own - penguins, zebras and antelopes, among others. "Black and White" was first published in 1963, the year of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech, and Ipcar has acknowledged her wish that her story might be read, in part, as an appeal for racial equality. Yet this is not just another message book. The daughter of the sculptor William Zorach and the artist Marguerite Zorach, Ipcar, now 97, illustrated her first picture book, "The Little Fisherman," with a text by Margaret Wise Brown, in 1945. Brown, best known as the author of "Goodnight Moon," remains America's peerless poet of early childhood, and it would seem that more than a little of Brown's puckish wit and calming lyricism rubbed off on her collaborator in this waggish tale about a "little black dog and a little white dog" with big dreams. What, though, of the little girl who speaks the title line in "Tell Me What to Dream About"? She and her big sister are chattering away at lights-out in the room they share. But what exactly are we overhearing? An anxious child's forlorn complaint, or a classic bid to keep the conversation going a while longer at bedtime? Either way, the younger child's request and her sister's indulgent responses give Giselle Potter all the reason she needs to paint a series of playful, faux-naïf, surrealist-inflected fantasy tableaus, nearly all of them suggested by a toy, fabric pattern or other visual prompt in the room. It is sad of course to imagine a child feeling all thumbs about dreaming. Might this then be a bellwether tale about the rumored dire effects of overabsorption in new media? Maybe yes and maybe no. But it is just as plausible to read Potter's scenario as an old-fashioned reminder that young children almost always have too much to absorb, and that for them a quiet story time in the company of a nurturing parent or caregiver is a reliable antidote to a day's worth of newness and chaos. Margaret Wise Brown waxed wise indeed when she described the essential difference between the ordinary run of stories that children tell themselves and those to be found in the children's books that rise to the level of literature. "A child's own story," Brown observed, "is a dream, but a good story is a dream that is true for more than one child." A very particular little girl like the one we meet here might well be unsatisfied with her own and her sister's improvisations. But the evocative dreamscapes of "Tell Me What to Dream About" are another story. LEONARD S. MARCUS is the author, most recently, of "Randolph Caldecott: The Man Who Could Not Stop Drawing."
School Library Journal Review
PreS-Gr 1-Edmond, a red squirrel, is a real homebody. He loves to make nut jam, read adventure stories, and is masterful at making pompoms. Mr. George Owl, his upstairs neighbor in their chestnut tree, is always out and about. He spends his time collecting feathers, moss, bark, and such, which he uses to create elaborate disguises. At the bottom of the chestnut tree lives Harry, a bear, who is known far and wide for his outstanding parties. These quirky yet endearing characters form the basis of the story that draws the neighbors together, with the help of some most excellent nut jam, and brings timid Edmond (wearing his best pompom hat) out of his shell as he accompanies George (dressed as a seagull) to the party. The only thing more engaging than the characterizations are Boutavant's bright and luminous illustrations. The depictions of the interiors of the creatures' homes and woodland friends and neighbors are cheery and fanciful and moonlit scenes are pure magic. For anyone who has every been hesitant to take a social risk, Edmond is a great role model. He's determined to continue his pursuits of making nut jam and pompoms, too. But he's decided that being surrounded by friends was surely what suited him best of all. VERDICT A sweet and satisfying treat, especially for those who are late to the friendship party.-Luann Toth, School Library Journal © Copyright 2015. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Kirkus Review
Three very different animal characters live in separate apartments in the old chestnut tree. Edmond, the reclusive, artistic squirrel, lives in a cozy apartment in a chestnut tree, making magnificent pompoms and nut jam. The flamboyant Mr. George Owl lives at the top of the tree, indulging his passion for disguise. He loves to masquerade as different animalsperhaps a rhinoceros, tarantula, or polar bearusing costumes he constructs from natural materials. Hospitable Harry the bear lives on the ground floor of the tree, and he is planning a party for all the animals. Edmond wants to be invited but is much too shy to go. He cries into his nut jam and then goes sadly to bed. But Mr. George Owl persuades him to attend the party, and they go together, the owl strangely disguised as a sea gull. Edmond has a good time, makes some friends, and starts to come out of his shell. He concludes that "Being surrounded by friends was surely what suited him best of all." No doubt in the interest of readability, the bland, overlong text is typeset in monolithic chunks, but it lacks any visual interaction with the illustrations. This meandering, elliptical rendition of the familiar themes of friendship and acceptance is rescued by Boutavant's vibrantly colorful and elegant illustrations, which offer myriad child-friendly details to pore over. Buy the book for the illustrations and for the concept of living in a tree, which every preschooler will love. (Picture book. 3-6) Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
