You cannot always judge a book by its cover (Goodnight Moon - Margaret Wise Brown)

Member Name: maria14

Product:	Goodnight Moon - Margaret Wise Brown
Date:	15/04/09 (110 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: A mesmeric journey into sleep - beautiful to read aloud

Disadvantages: A jaded first appearance

I bought this book for my fifteen month old daughter, after a self help guide to getting your baby to sleep recommended it as a soothing bed time read.

It cost me £4.99 from Amazon and when it arrived, I thought it was the worst children's book I had ever seen.

A board book written in the 1940s, the book still has a distinctly pre war feel. The font and illustrations are basic and dated looking, and while many of the pages are just black and white, the pages that are coloured, only feature garish red, orange, green, white and black.

The text starts ' In the great green room,
There is a red balloon.
And a picture of ...'

The book then goes on to list the various items in the bedroom of a badly drawn baby rabbit, who eventually falls asleep.

The sense that I had paid £4.99 for the world's worst children's book was affirmed when my book loving 1 year old refused to stick around for the second page. The offending book with its dated text and clumsy illustrations was cast aside.

Weeks later, I picked it up again and read it as a bedtime story. In the quiet of a dimly lit bedroom, with the last light of the day at the window, the magic of this book became apparent.

The text and pictures have a mesmeric quality, as you slip in and out of colour, listing and repeating the items in the room.

'A comb and a brush, and a bowl full of mush, and a quiet old lady whispering hush...'

The text is made to be read - or whispered - aloud into the ears of children quietening down to sleep. The writer had composed a poem in which the clever use of consonants 'shushes' your child to sleep.

This is one of those magical books where you see more in the illustrations every time you look - far from being basic and clumsy, the illustrations are deliberately sparse and delicately detailed. The pictures of the bedroom that appeared to be the same on every page, actually show the changes in the bedroom during the half hour it takes for the little bunny to fall asleep - the clocks move on, the moon comes up, the kittens leave the room as does the old lady whispering hush.

I cannot recommend this book highly enough. I am sure when you buy it, you will be as thrown at its first appearance as I was. But persist - an it will become a book to treasure. It is now the only book my daughter wants at bedtime.

Summary: A wonderful book for small children