Goodnight, World

Written and illustrated by Andrea Lynn Beck

North Winds Press (Scholastic Canada)

978-1-4431-4865-8

32 pp.

Ages 2-6

September 2019

It's not always easy for children to see beyond their own worlds. Not everyone gets an opportunity to travel and experience how others live firsthand. But that should not limit their understanding or ability to feel compassion. In Andrea Lynn Beck's newest picture book, a child wonders about other children around the world who too are heading to bed, recognizing that they will be both very different and still similar.

From Goodnight, World by Andrea Lynn Beck

A child who lives with his family on a sailboat is preparing for bed and looking up at the sky and questioning whether other children are looking up and seeing the same stars. He thinks about those on different continents–his room houses a number of geographical instruments like a map, compass, globe and sextant to fuel this attention–and the structures they might live in and the furniture upon which they sleep.

From Goodnight, World by Andrea Lynn Beck

In lovely rhyming text that melds innocence with curiosity, Andrea Lynn Beck presents a global appreciation of all children as they settle in for the night under domes or roofs with goats, in caves, on boats, in high-rises or buildings made of mud and straw. The boy imagines wonderful landscapes far and wide, high and low, and the children often reading, sometimes playing, before sleep under a common celestial feature. 

As the illustrations in her earlier picture book Good Night, Canada demonstrate, Andrea Lynn Beck's pencil crayon and paint on watercolour paper artwork is bright and fresh and reflective of a child's perspective and reality. She invites readers into a child's room, to cuddle with a stuffie and dog, and to dream of other lands and children. And for those who want to learn a little more about the homes shown throughout the book, Andrea Lynn Beck shares stories about each, including how she created the book to show how our world is our home.

Our world is so big, and sometimes so small...

It is our home, goodnight to us all.

Goodnight, World will definitely be added to my Read a Book of Bedtime booklist for its comforting take on a child's end of day reflection and wonder about the world and its children.

🌎🌏🌍🌎🌍

A French-language edition, Bonne nuit autour du monde, will also be released by Scholastic Canada this month.

Goodnight, Canada

by Andrea Beck 

North Winds Press (Scholastic Canada)
978-1-4431-0782-2
32 pp.

Ages 3-7

2012

Goodnight, Canada follows a young boy's nightly ritual of adieus from coast to coast to coast, as he looks out his window at his country and wonders who else is going to bed.  Providing a double-page spread of provincial or territorial features for each Canadian region, Andrea Beck's whimsical illustrations show children in beds, in a boat, on a flower pot rock formation, in a sled, in a plane, and even embedded in an inuksuk.  And they're all comforted by playful bears, cats, dogs, birds, and even moose reminiscent of Andrea Beck's Elliot Moose series.

While many may see Goodnight, Canada as our own version of Margaret Wise Brown's Goodnight Moon,  I believe Andrea Beck's newest picture book is more of a compendium of all things Canadian.  From our different landscapes (like the farm patchwork quilt on the P.E.I. child's bed), provincial and territorial birds, flowers, flags, and landmarks (like the CN Tower in Ontario) to iconic celebrations (e.g., the Calgary Stampede) and wonders (e.g., aurora borealis), Goodnight, Canada allows every child to see him- or herself and enjoy wondering about other children around our country.

It's unusual to find a sweet, rhyming picture book that can also work as an information book, here about Canada, but you can consider Goodnight, Canada an exemplar of one.  And consider this book as a perfect gift for a Canadian child in your life with whom you can curl up beside at bedtime to travel across our grand country in only 32 pages.