The House in the Night

by Susan Marie Swanson

Overview

A spare, patterned text and glowing pictures explore the origins of light that make a house a home in this bedtime book for young children. Naming nighttime things that are both comforting and intriguing to preschoolers—a key, a bed, the moon—this timeless book illuminates a reassuring order to the universe.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780547528304
Publisher:	HarperCollins Publishers
Publication date:	05/05/2008
Sold by:	HARPERCOLLINS
Format:	eBook
Pages:	40
File size:	17 MB
Note:	This product may take a few minutes to download.
Age Range:	3 - 6 Years

About the Author

Susan Marie Swanson is an award-winning poet and the author of several children's books. She lives in St. Paul, Minnesota.

Read an Excerpt

Here is the key to the house In the house burns a light In that light rests a bed On that bed waits a book . . .

Editorial Reviews

Using only a few graceful words per page to illuminate the dark, this bedtime gem shines its light clearly on things that matter-a home filled with books, art, music and ever-present love. Krommes's (The Lamp, the Ice, and a Boat Called Fish) astonishing illustrations are so closely intertwined with the meticulous text that neither can be isolated without a loss of meaning. The book begins, intriguingly, "Here is the key to the house./ In the house burns a light./ In that light rests a bed./ On that bed waits a book." That book takes the child reader up into the skies and back home again, to sleep ("dark in the song, song in the bird, / bird in the book, book on the bed"). Krommes's black-and-white scratchboard illustrations are as delicate and elegant as snowflakes, and she uses a single color, a marigold, to bring warmth to both home and stars. This volume's artful simplicity, homely wisdom and quiet tone demonstrate the interconnected beauty and order of the world in a way that both children and adults will treasure. Ages 3-6. (May)

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Publishers Weekly

PreS-Gr 1- Inspired by traditional cumulative poetry, Swanson weaves a soothing song that is as luminescent and soulful as the gorgeous illustrations that accompany her words. A journey both humble and epic begins with a key to a house. "Here is the key to the house./In the house burns a light./In that light rests a bed...." In the bedroom of the house, a girl reads a book in which a bird "breathes a song...all about the starry dark." Swanson's poem then takes readers on a flight across the night sky to the realm of the moon and sun, then back along the path to the key that marked the beginning of the journey. Krommes's folk-style black-and-white etchings with touches of yellow-orange make the world of the poem an enchanted place. Patches of light and shadow give shape to the darkness, while smiling celestial bodies populate the potentially lonely night with their friendly warmth. This picture book will make a strong impression on listeners making their first acquaintance with literature. It is a masterpiece that has all the hallmarks of a classic that will be loved for generations to come.-Jayne Damron, Farmington Community Library, MI

School Library Journal

Inspired by a traditional poem from The Oxford Nursery Rhyme Book, Swanson's cumulative tale begins, "Here is the key to the house." Readers are welcomed inside the house, where they find a light, a bed within the light, a book on that bed and a bird inside that book. The book opens to reveal a bird that sings a song about the dark, and within that song are the moon and the sun shining on the moon's face. And then, from deep in the night, the poem begins to climb back out of itself: "Sun in the moon, / moon in dark, / dark in the song, / song in the bird," and so forth, finally arriving back to "the house in the night" which is, indeed, a "home full of light." Krommes's breathtaking scratchboard illustrations, in black and white with accents of yellow and gold, embody and enhance the text's message that light and dark, like comfort and mystery, are not mutually exclusive, but integral parts of each other. (Picture book. 3-7)

Kirkus Reviews

"Krommes’s widening perspective manages to exude both comfort and daring." — New York Times Book Review "Here the art is spectacular. Executed in scratchboard decorated in droplets of gold, Krommes’ illustrations expand on Swanson’s reassuring story (inspired by a nursury rhyme that begins, “This is the key of the kingdom”) to create a world as cozy inside a house as it is majestic outside."—Booklist, starred review "Inspired by traditional cumulative poetry, Swanson weaves a soothing song that is as luminescent and soulful as the gorgeous illustrations that accompany her words. . . . It is a masterpiece that has all the hallmarks of a classic that will be loved for generations to come."—School Library Journal, starred review "Krommes’s breathtaking scratchboard illustrations, in black and white with accents of yellow and gold, embody and enhance the text’s message that light and dark, like comfort and mystery, are not mutually exclusive, but integral parts of each other."—Kirkus Reviews, starred review "This volume's artful simplicity, homely wisdom and quiet tone demonstrate the interconnected beauty and order of the world in a way that both children and adults will treasure."—Publishers Weekly, starred review "...in another standout performance by an illustrator, Beth Krommes makes a case for The House in the Night with scratchboard images that are themselves a throwback, but with a welcome kind of familiarity... I can see a night-skittish child taking comfort in this story at bedtime."— The Washington Post (online) "[A] book of stunning visual simplicity . . . The pictures themselves seem to reach out from domesticity toward infinity."—Liz Rosenberg, Boston Sunday Globe "It's Wanda Gag meets Virginia Lee Burton.  And gorgeous.  Did I mention gorgeous?  Gorgeous."— Fuse 8 Production (online), by Betsy Bird "[Swanson] has a lyrical style all her own, complemented by Krommes' starkly stunning scratchpaper drawings."— StarTribune —

From the Publisher