Current Gone! Stars Shine Brighter in a Blackout

Boredom, mosquitoes, and an opportunity for togetherness arrive with a power outage in Bally and Ladi’s busy communal snapshot. Thrust into darkness when the electricity goes out, the intergenerational, light-brown-skinned residents of a house in a tropical setting attempt to adapt: “Knees bump./ Toes stub./ Hands grasp blindly,/ searching, seeking.” The arrival of friends, game and guitar in hand, adds a sense of merrymaking as the companions make shadow animals in candlelight and cool off by eating “frozen treasures scooped out from the freezer.” Outside, “moonbeams bathe/ sticky skin,” and the group appreciate an undiluted view of the stars until the electricity returns. Staccato prose pinpoints the resultant ambivalence: “Emotions mixed./ Feelings tangled./ Darkness is gone.” Appropriately playing with light and shadow, chalky digital drawings center on cozy domestic scenes, and a horizontal spread of the night sky offers a dazzling climax that’s pitch-perfect for this bright-eyed and appreciative tale about embracing the dark. An author’s note concludes. Ages 4–8. (June)