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Summary
Summary
A girl named Harriet longs to play her cello alone in her room. But when a noisy owl disrupts her solitude, Harriet throws her teacup out the window and accidentally knocks the moon out of the sky in frustration. Over the course of an evening, Harriet and the moon become fast friends. Worried that he'll catch a chill, Harriet buys the moon a soft woolen hat, then takes him on a boat ride across a glistening lake, something he's only dreamed of. But can she work up the courage to play her music for the moon? In this delicate bedtime story about a shy young cello player who learns to share her music with the moon, the award-winning Philip and Erin Stead deliver another whimsical, visually oriented picture book in their signature style. The duo of Philip and Erin Stead are "one of the most notable names in children's literature" -ABC News
Author Notes
ERIN and PHILIP STEAD are an award-winning picture book team. Their book A Sick Day for Amos McGee (400,000 plus copies sold to date) won the Caldecott Medal and was named a New York Times Best Illustrated Book and a Publisher's Weekly Best Children's Book. Other popular books include Bear Has a Story to Tell, an E. B White Award Honor Book. Most recently they collaborated with Mark Twain on The Purloining of Prince Oleomargarine, a major New York Times Bestseller and the recipient of much major media attention including profiles on CBS Sunday Morning and The New Yorker. They live in Michigan.
Reviews (5)
Publisher's Weekly Review
A girl named Harriet accidentally knocks the moon out of the sky in this story by the Caldecott Award-winning Steads. He's a round, lemony globe with a kindly expression who dreams of not being the moon; she takes him rowing on a lake (which he's always wanted to do), then carries him home into the sky with the help of some owls and a fishing net. But the tale is perhaps better understood as a portrait of Harriet, a solemn, solitary child with a long braid who loves to play the cello but hates to be watched. "Someday you will play your cello in a big orchestra," her parents say. "Won't that make you happy?" Harriet retreats to a secret place in her mind: "Then she closed her eyes and changed her parents into penguins." The fine lines of Erin Stead's pencil drawings introduce readers to Harriet's inner life, where the wishes of her parents and the glare of the world can't intrude. It's a deep, almost reverent look at how a child can use her imagination to create not just the world she wants, but the world she needs. Ages 4-8. (Mar.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Horn Book Review
In their latest collaboration (A Sick Day for Amos McGee, rev. 5/10; Lenny Lucy, rev. 9/15; et al.), the Steads protagonist is a painfully shy girl named Harriet Henry. Harriet is so shy that she is spared an appearance on the books front cover (though she is present on the back, playing cello for a barely visible moon). After rejecting her parents suggestion that she will grow up to play in an orchestra, Harriet retreats to her room to play her cello. Frustrated by an owls persistent hooting, she hurls a teacup (which she has imagined into existence) at it. Here and throughout, the text employs whimsical turns of phrase and gentle, playful fantasy: Harriet did not want to hurt the owl. I just want to be alone, she thought. Then she sat back down and tried to change her regret into a new teacup. Before her imagination can perform such a feat, the room fills with smoke and Harriet discovers that the thrown teacup has hit the moon, causing it to fall and stop up the chimney. An unlikely friendship ensues, with Harriet (who introduces herself to the moon as Hank) enabling the moon (who introduces himself to Harriet as Mister Moon) to experience things he only dreamed of while positioned in the sky. Eventually, she helps Mister Moon return there and reluctantly, but satisfyingly, agrees to play for him. Erin Steads prints, embellished with colored pencil and graphite, use point of view to create perceptual distance while simultaneously establishing a close emotional connection. megan dowd lambert September/October 2019 p.73(c) Copyright 2019. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Booklist Review
Meet Harriet Henry (you may call her Hank), whose parents tell her that someday she can play her cello in a big orchestra. Won't that make you happy? they ask. Well, frankly, no. The prospect makes her hands sweaty and her face hot. She just wants to play her cello alone. And so she retreats to her room to play for herself, but, alas, she is interrupted by a pesky owl's HOO-HOO-HOO-ing. To scare it away, she throws her teacup at it, which, to her dismay, hits the moon instead and knocks him from his perch in the sky. Horrors! What to do? Well, Mister Moon wants a hat, and so Hank gets him a striped one. He wants to float on the lake, and so Hank secures a boat for just that purpose. And finally, he wants her to play her cello for him. Uh-oh. Yes, Hank is an ingenious girl with a gift for making things, but can she craft a way to accommodate Mister Moon's request? Philip C. Stead's charming story is superbly illustrated by Erin E. Stead's softly colored, delicate pictures that are beautifully rendered with mono printed oil inks, colored pencils, and graphite. The result is a generous twofer: a gift for the eyes and a delight for the imagination. Encore, please.--Michael Cart Copyright 2019 Booklist
School Library Journal Review
PreS-Gr 2-What if you threw your teacup out the window and it accidentally knocked the moon out of the sky? All Harriet wants to do is practice her cello alone in her room. While she prepares to play, she imagines her room is a little house with a kitchen table, a teacup, and a fireplace. But each time she attempts to begin playing, she is repeatedly interrupted by a loud hooting owl. In attempts to make the owl quiet down, Harriet (who goes by Hank) throws her teacup out the window and into the night! The owl flies away but soon Harriet realizes that she has knocked the moon from the sky and into her chimney. After helping him out of the chimney, the shy musician and Mr. Moon adventure into the night and do many things including finding the perfect hat for Mr. Moon and even enjoying a midnight boat ride. Harriet has made amends for her mistake, but will she work up the courage to play music for her new friend? The award-winning Steads who are best known for their Caldecott Medal book A Sick Day for Amos McGee are back with a delightful picture book in their signature style. The soft and dreamlike illustrations done with oil based monoprinting on a sheet of acrylic and are the perfect accompaniment to the simple and thoughtful prose as they work in harmony to bring Harriet's dream to the pages. VERDICT A gentle bedtime story that is recommended for all.-Elizabeth Blake, Brooklyn Public Library © Copyright 2019. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Kirkus Review
In making amends for a thoughtless act, a shy young cellist finds just the right audience.So afflicted with performance anxiety that her parents' mere suggestion that she might play in an orchestra one day makes her flushed and sweaty, Harriet Henry retreats to her room and transforms it into a small, isolated house in which she can practice unheard. But when the teacup she throws through a window to silence an annoying owl knocks the moon down from the sky, Harrietintroducing herself, with a deft bit of gender fluidity, as "Hank"makes a wagon and responds to the wishes of "Mister Moon" by wheeling him first to the hat maker (a bear) for a warm hat, then down to the lake to listen to water and a distant bell buoy ("There is so much music down below," he comments. "It is so quiet up in the sky"), then finally back to the sky to play for the moon, who has promised not to cheer or even watch. The illustrations, as spare and harmonious as the prose, are pale constructs of lightly applied pencil over misty ink monoprints featuring a large, gently glowing moon with human features, a comically tiny wagon, and a serious-looking, pigtailed child (white, like her parents) barely if at all taller than her instrument. The ability of Harriet/Hank to remake her surroundings at will not only enhances the episode's dreamlike quality, but should also strike a chord in retiring or introspective readers.A low-key, atmospheric encounter a-glimmer with verbal and visual grace notes. (Picture book. 6-9) Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
