Good Night, Baby Animals You’ve Had A Busy Day: A Treasury of Six Original Stories

These six stories about seven wild baby animals (there are twin tiger cubs) share a common narrative structure. An adorable protagonist, lightly anthropomorphized by Watkins (Can You Yawn Like a Fawn?) in tender mixed-media images, ventures out into the world to test its independence or learn new skills; in most of the stories, food is the motivator. Mama steps in to offer security and succor, bedtime arrives, the narrator wishes the baby animal “good night,” and everyone snuggles. Winnick (Lucy’s Cave) incorporates fun sound effects and a smattering of repetition into each of the stories: Baby Elephant mimics his mother’s actions (“Up, up. Mama reaches leaves. Up, up. Baby Elephant almost reaches leaves!”), while Baby Giraffe drinks his mother’s milk with a “glub, glub, glub.” Is that a leopard Baby Rhino sees? Can Baby Panda get himself unstuck from the bamboo thicket? What will Baby Gorilla discover during her family’s trek up the mountain? There’s just enough dramatic tension to keep the pages turning without riling up any soon-to-be sleepers. Ages 2–5. Author’s agent: Ann Tobias. Illustrator’s agency: Bright Agency. (Jan.)