While Everyone is Sleeping, by Sarah Mackenzie | Dedicated Review

Book Review of While Everyone is Sleeping
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The Children’s Book Review

While Everyone is Sleeping

Written by Sarah Mackenzie

Illustrated by Gabrielle Grimard

Ages 2+ | 40 Pages

Publisher: Waxwing Books (2023) | ISBN-13: 9781956393026

What to Expect: Animals, nature, dancing, music, nighttime, and courage.

For some people, night is a scary time when the world is dark and unfamiliar. However, While Everyone is Sleeping shows readers that night can also be a magical time, full of mysteries and joy only available to those willing to risk the unknown to follow their curiosity and desires.

While everyone else sleeps tight, one little shrew is woken by the moonlight and beckoned into the nighttime garden. It’s a little bit frightening, but the moonlight’s call is just too strong to resist. Has she been followed? Is everyone really sleeping? And what is that glorious smell? Soon, the little shrew finds herself in a magical moonflower garden, dancing joyously with the other nighttime creatures—moths, fireflies, frogs, and centipedes, all tapping, buzzing, humming, and twirling to the same nocturnal dance. Only when the sun begins to peek out from behind the moon does the tiny shrew creeps back to her bed, looking forward to her next moonlit adventure.

The beautiful adventure is told in lilting rhyme, mimicking the dance that the nighttime creatures enjoy and inviting readers to join in their fun. The creatures are realistically rendered in stunning watercolor illustrations that present flowers, insects, and forests as magical and fairy-like.

While Everyone is Sleeping is a beautiful, enchanting story sure to inspire readers with curiosity, a love of nature, and a sense of joy.

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About the Author

Sarah Mackenzie (readaloudrevival.com) is an enthusiastic reader of picture books and host of the Read-Aloud Revival podcast. She lives in Eastern Washington with her husband and six kids, where she homeschools, reads aloud, and tries to leave each day a little more beautiful than she found it.

About the Illustrator

Gabrielle Grimard (gabriellegrimard.com) draws worlds in which she’d like to live. Focusing on light and color, she primarily uses watercolor, gouache, and oil paints. She lives with her family in Quebec, Canada.

Dedicated Reviews allow authors and illustrators to gain prompt visibility for their work. This is a sponsored*, non-biased review of While Everyone is Sleeping. Learn more about getting a book review …