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Summary
Summary
Join these adorable elephants for a lyrical good night routine in this tender bedtime tale from the bestselling author of Time for Bed and Hello Baby!
After all the kissing, and the hugging, and the rocking, and the snuggling, there at last comes a time for--sleeping.
From beloved, bestselling picture book author Mem Fox, this cozy, dreamy bedtime book is a soothing lullaby that's just right for lulling little ones to sleep.
Author Notes
Mem Fox was born on March 5, 1946 in Melbourne, Australia. She attended a drama school in London. She returned to Australia where she was a college professor.
She writes children's books including Possum Magic, Night Noises, Wilfrid Gordon McDonald Partridge, Time for Bed, Koala Lou, Wombat Divine, Ten Little Fingers and Ten Little Toes, Hello Baby!, A Giraffe in the Bath (co-written with Olivia Rawson), Count Goats!, and The Little Dragon. She has also written several books for adults.
She has received numerous awards including the 1990 Dromkeen Medal for distinguished services to children's literature, a 1991 Advance Australia Award for her outstanding contribution to Australian literature, and a medal in the 1993 Australia Day Honours awards for services to the cultural life of Australia.
(Bowker Author Biography)
Reviews (5)
Publisher's Weekly Review
Here's a wonderful little lesson in the subjunctive from master teacher Fox (Ten Little Fingers and Ten Little Toes). As a purple mother elephant gets her lavender baby ready for bed, she enumerates all the things she "could" do: "I could eat your little ears./ I could nibble on your nose./ I could munch your tiny fingers./ I could gobble up your toes." Readers will instantly know that Mom has actually done-or is doing-all these things and more, but her savvy grammatical construction enables the mother elephant to assure her baby that he's adorable while acknowledging the higher power of discipline and routine: "There comes a time for sleeping and our sleepy time is now." Quay's (Goodnight, Me) mixed-media pictures establish a mood of reverie, and her characters have blissful, loving expressions that keep the cooing text from turning soggy; sharp eyes will notice that she incorporates actual items of cozy domesticity, like doilies and handkerchiefs, into the pictures. After a few pages of soft-crayoned textures, pastel hues, and arm's-length framing, a visual sameness sets in, though readers should find it soporific. Ages 4-8. (Aug.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Horn Book Review
Mem Fox proves once again that she's a contemporary Mother Goose as she delivers seemingly effortless rhyming verse in her latest bedtime book. "I could eat your little ears. / I could nibble on your nose. / I could munch your tiny fingers. / I could gobble up your toes." The easy rhythm of the book's opening lines evokes a "haven't-I-heard-this-before?" feeling and pulls the reader along to subsequent pages ("I could stroke your silky hair. / I could sit you on my knee. / I could sing you all the songs that my mother sang to me") that lead up to a final kiss good-night. In another artist's hands those opening words might have seemed alarming--with all their talk of eating, nibbling, munching, and gobbling--but Quay's soft mixed-media art in pastel hues depicts the gentle, rounded forms of anthropomorphic parent-and-child elephants and exudes calming comfort. Refreshingly, there's no resistance on the part of the little one: this elephant's child is plainly tuckered out and ready for baby bedtime. A good good-night book. megan dowd lambert (c) Copyright 2014. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Booklist Review
This charming picture book, intended for very young audiences, visits the familiar territory of bedtime. Using simple declarative sentences, Mama Elephant tells her baby what she could do all night long: nibble fingers, gobble toes, tell stories, sing songs, and so on. However, Mama reiterates, once sleepy time comes, it is time to go to sleep. The repetitive, simple language creates a calm, soothing, lullabylike effect that is perfectly complemented by soft crayon-and-watercolor illustrations. Parents who mimic Mama Elephant's actions (stroking hair, holding hands) will be moving their child in the right direction towards slumber until they inevitably hear, Read it again! This should resonate with babies, toddlers, and their designated adult readers, and when presented alongside other bedtime classics, it makes a great choice for parent-and-child story hours.--McBroom, Kathleen Copyright 2014 Booklist
School Library Journal Review
PreS-In this soothing bedtime ode, an elephant in a bathrobe snuggles and carries her baby up to bed. Gentle hugs and kisses are accompanied by nose nibbles, toe gobbles, cradling, whispers, book reading, hair stroking, and yawns as bedtime draws near. In this beautifully designed book, a line of text is paired with an image rendered in muted pencils, acrylic paint, and Photoshop. Each illustration abounds in patterns and textures created from items such as doilies, handkerchiefs, lace, baskets, and belts. The elephants have an unfocused, sketchy look that pairs perfectly with twilight and dreams around the corner. This gentle lullaby in book form is perfect for sleepy toddlers and parents who will want to mimic the actions in the book.-Marge Loch-Wouters, La Crosse Public Library, WI (c) Copyright 2012. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Kirkus Review
A beautifully rendered, anthropomorphic elephant tenderly (sort of) puts a pachyderm child to bed.The first four sets of pages feature large, bold, purple words on the verso and charmingly smudgy pastel-and-collage artwork on the recto. The initial phrase, "I could eat your little ears," is set opposite a watercolor adult elephant wearing a patterned bathrobe and affectionately embracing a baby elephant. The background is a tastefully decorated room, including a lacy chair holding a thumbed-through (or perhaps trunked-through) book. Established, the pattern follows with this banal-at-best and alarming-at-worst text: "I could nibble on your nose. / I could munch your tiny fingers. / I could gobble up your toes." The pastel purple and gold artwork mesmerizes, as the adult elephant tenderly hoists the baby and proceeds to carry it upstairs toward the bedroom. The text then mentions numerous other possible, now-gentle actions by the adult elephant, as in "I could sing you all the songs that my mother sang to me." Eventually, the rhyming text reaches the expected conclusion, with the adult elephant gently kissing the babe, laid in a bassinet, to sleep. Though it is eminently clear that this child is not about to become supper, the cannibalistic opening quatrain followed by a gushingly affectionate outpouring makes for a book that only a certain type of grandparent could read aloud to a very young grandchild.Quay's striking illustrations cannot rescue this one. (Picture book. 1-3) Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.