Monkey

July 1, 2017
Brown's anthropomorphic Monkey returns, and this time he's not ready for bedtime.Conspicuously absent from this book is Monkey's baby brother (from the earlier title Monkey Not Ready for Baby, 2016). But Monkey's big brother and parents are present, and they all try to help him get to sleep. Alas, soothing nighttime routines fail to do the trick, and this ends up making Monkey feel tired at school. Brown's accompanying watercolor-and-gouache illustrations in the school scenes show Monkey asleep at his desk, pencil in hand, and nodding off on a swing while a young lion friend looks on with concern. After seeing him fall asleep at the dinner table, Monkey's brother encourages him to try counting things in his mind to fall asleep. At first Monkey doesn't think this sounds very promising, but when he decides to count dinosaurs he ends up engaging in imaginative flights of fancy with many different dinosaurs, an activity that ultimately sends him to dreamland. Endpapers featuring those dinosaurs extend the story beyond the main narrative and hand-lettered text combines with a studied, childlike style to give it a friendly look, though little else feels particularly fresh about this bedtime book. An adequate treatment of a well-trod theme. (Picture book. 2-5)

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August 21, 2017
Having previously adjusted to kindergarten and a new sibling, Monkey struggles with falling asleep in this simultaneously funny and sympathetic story. Brown again uses childlike handwriting, pencil scribbles, and splotches of paint to give the sense that Monkey is telling his own story. Monkey’s complaints will be familiar to many families (“I’m thirsty,” “I’m not tired”), as will his parents’ efforts to help (warm milk, a backrub) and the effects of not enough sleep (a young lion stares at Monkey with concern the next day—he has fallen asleep mid-swing on the playground). Counting dinosaurs at bedtime leads to raucous fun (“He flies with the Dimorphodons. He rocks with T. rex”), an outpouring of energy that sends Monkey to sleep. Brown’s attention to detail in his gouache and colored pencil images elevates an otherwise familiar struggling-with-sleep story. Ages 3–7.