A love song to storybooks, as well as a laugh-out-loud bedtime story that promises to leave little ones cozy and sleepy-even with the giggles it will bring.
This delightful picture book starts with a very big-and very relatable-problem: No matter how hard she tries, our protagonist just can't seem to fall asleep. Could she have skipped a step in her bedtime routine? Just in case, it's best to do it all over again! So she brushes her teeth, puts on her pajamas, and says good night to Daddy. But no luck-she still can't get to sleep! So she ventures outside, where she meets a very sleepy bear who shares her same problem. To help him, she runs inside for a book to read him a bedtime story. In the blink of an eye, the bear is snoring away, and the girl suddenly gets it. That's it! She forgot to have her dad read her a bedtime story. And so, it's back to the house, back to her dad, back to bed, and finally . . . to sleep! Children and parents alike will love this story that celebrates the magic of bedtime stories shared between a parent and child. In Bruno Zocca's creative world, anything goes. His zany and fanciful illustrations are populated with delightful characters and creatures who live in a parallel universe where the laws of nature don't seem to exist. His delicate ink line drawings are beautifully contrasted with flat digital colors, giving them a retro and timeless look and feel. Zocca was born in Verona, studied illustration and graphic design at ISIA in Urbino, and now lives and works in Bologna. In 2014, his works were selected at the Illustrators Exhibition of the Bologna Children's Book Fair, where he also won the Ars In Fabula Grant Award. His illustrations for Mio Nonno Gigante (My Giant Grandpa), written by Davide Calì, won the 2019 Premio Letteratura Ragazzi Award. He is the author-illustrator of E se fossi qualcosa'altro (What If I Were Something Else?), a 2024 Winner of the Premio Bettoni for Best Picture Book, and was a Sendak Fellow in 2023. Zocca loves the art of picture books, the drawings of Alfred Kubin, the colors of Beni Montresor, and all of William Steig's books.
