Christmas in the Barn by Margaret Wise Brown (
Goodnight Moon;
The Runaway Bunny) was first published in 1952 as a lyrical narrative with wood-cut illustrations by Barbara Cooney. Here, Brown's appealing picture book about the Nativity (baby Jesus is only identified as "the newborn babe") is reissued with cheerful, roughly textured paintings of a sun-soaked desert landscape and a menagerie of personality-loaded sheep, donkeys, camels, horses and mice (even a cat and dog!) in oil paint, pastel, pencil and marker by the late Anna Dewdney (the Llama Llama books). "In a big warm barn in an ancient field/ The oxen lowed, the donkey squealed,/ The horses stomped, the cattle sighed,/ And quietly the daylight died/ In the sunset of the west." A lost couple walks into that barn and is welcomed by all the curious animals... until "the first wail of the newborn babe reached the night/ Where one great star was burning bright." A charming, truly preschooler-friendly addition to the Christmas picture-book shelf. --
Karin Snelson, children's & YA editor,
Shelf Awareness
