Review by Booklist Review
Ages 5^-8. Spare, lyrical words and luminous, richly textured pictures reveal the mysterious, hidden world of the desert night in this beautiful volume. "With a rush of wings bats spill from a cave," and the desert evening begins, described in a book-length poem filled with sound: the sweep and whir of the birds and insects, the owl's hoot, and the coyote's cry ("song of wonder, song of hunger, song of being alone"). Deceptively simple, the words create an elegant, repetitious rhythm that combines the immediacy of onomatopoeia ("Whirrrrrrrrr") with subtle, musical lines--"under countless stars, along wrinkled hills, over the desert sharp with spikes and spines and prongs. The desert fills with songs." But it's Young's glowing illustrations that are truly exceptional here. Double-spread collages of delicate, fibrous paper and deep-toned paint shift perspectives from a close-up of insects to sweeping landscapes to a haunting aerial view of snake trails in the sand. Quiet but not serene, the paintings evoke the mystery and unsettling beauty in the vibrant, stark landscape. Although classified as fiction, this is poetry that will find use across the curriculum, in science and language-arts classes. --Gillian Engberg
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
"Day is done./ Twilight comes./ The sun goes down/ and streaks the clouds/ with flame." Johnston (The Barn Owls) lyrically evokes the end of desert heat and the beginning of shadows at the close of day as Young's (Lon Po Po) opening spreads of a sky aflame in yellow hues give way to orange. By the first page of text, wine-colored clouds engulf two lonely cacti. As Johnston's poem picks up speed ("Suddenly/ with a rush of wings/ bats spill from a cave in a hill"), Young offers a view from within the bats' cave as they soar over a cactus-filled horizon. A life-size view of flowers and insects accompanies Johnston's litany of the exotic inhabitants ("weevils,/ beetlesÄ/ seeking the saguaro's/ sweet fruit"). Like a refrain, the rhythmic text circles back to the bats. At the poem's conclusion, the winged nocturnal creatures cling to the cave's roof, and Young imagines their last breathtaking view of the desert at daybreak, as the sun paints the terrain in sherbet hues. Ages 9-12. (Sept.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by School Library Journal Review
K-Gr 5-A poetic text and striking images evoke the sounds and sights of the desert night. As evening descends, the still landscape begins to hum with life. "The wind whispers./Wings whisper/as insects fly-," and on through the hours as owls, snakes, and coyotes emerge to look for food. Just before dawn, the nocturnal animals "slip into the cool/of desert hiding places./-into pools of shade"; the bats "-sleep then,/clustered/close and still." Young's mixed-media collage artwork complements the text beautifully; layers of cut-out forms of various textures and deep colors over background pastel illustrations create images that are as haunting and rich as the language. From dusk to dawn, a treat.-Daryl Grabarek, School Library Journal (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
When twilight comes to the Sonoran desert, bats fly from their cave like dry leaves blowing, like shadows on the wing, searching for insects. Moths, ants, weevils, and beetles populate the darkness. Some night animals sing, the owl and the coyote (Song of wonder. Song of hunger. Song of being alone), in contrast to the silence of snakes and the whirr of the bats. The text is a song, too, singing the deserts beauty. Youngs striking illustrations of pastels, collage, and textured paper show animals not mentioned in the textjavelinas and a lizardas well as some that are: bats, owl, quail, and coyote. Oddly, the snake, though mentioned, is missing from the pictures, perhaps hidden in the sinuous moonlit ridges of sand. When morning blooms the night things / slip into the cool / of desert hiding places, and the bats fly home until twilight comes again. Pictures and text are gentle and poetic, suggesting the mystery of the desert at night, where all is not as quiet as it might first appear. (Picture book. 4-8)
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
