Richie's Picks: RUSSELL THE SHEEP by Rob Scotton, HarperCollins, May 2005, ISBN: 0-06-059848-4; Lib.ISBN: 0-06-059849-2
"Last night I didn't get to sleep at all, no, no.
I lay awake and watched until the morning light
Washed away the darkness of the lonely night
And last night I didn't get to sleep, didn't get to sleep,
No, I didn't get to sleep at all."
--The Fifth Dimension

Between meetings, workshops, zigzagging between the various publisher booths, morning and evening social events, and late night nibbling at the new ARCs I've just scored, I don't get much sleep when I'm off at the various book-related conventions.

Five-plus years ago, Shari and I were strolling around the exhibition hall at ALA Midwinter in San Antonio. The best part of being "on the floor" at ALA Midwinter is the abundance of editors in attendance. It is always exciting to get an earful of what these frequently unsung heroes of the children's publishing industry actually have their hands on, along with what they've just completed in collaboration with their talented authors.

Anne Schwartz is one of those brilliant and charming editors with whom I love to chat. When Shari and I encountered Anne in San Antonio at that 2000 Midwinter convention, I immediately asked her what hot new literary magic she had up her sleeve for the distant fall season, then eight or nine months down the road.

When Anne responded that I HAD to see the picture book she'd just finished I was momentarily disappointed. The best thing you have for the entire fall season is a picture book? I said to myself, my hope having been that she'd instead be raving about the manuscript for some spectacular novel for eight-to-twelve-year-olds.

But my skepticism instantly evaporated as she opened a manilla file and pulled out a paste-up of OLIVIA. I'll never forget that first reading, including the ending when:

"Olivia's mom gives her a kiss and says, 'You know, you really wear me out. But I love you anyway.' And Olivia gives her a kiss back and says, 'I love you anyway too.' "

"Close your eyes and I'll close mine, goodnight sleep tight
Now the moon begins to shine, goodnight sleep tight
Dream sweet dreams for me, dream sweet dreams for you."
--The Beatles

I recall the OLIVIA incident because Rob Scotton's RUSSELL THE SHEEP is the cutest and funniest and best illustrated animal character I've seen in a picture book since OLIVIA. And while RUSSELL THE SHEEP won't officially come to the attention of the Caldecott committee the way OLIVIA did (being that Rob Scotton is British not American), I will be shocked if Russell does not similarly grab the Book Sense Illustrated Book of the Year award after he grabs the hearts and imaginations of large herds of American kids, young and old.

Rob Scotton is certainly no unknown quantity in Britain. Not only a celebrated illustrator of greeting cards and posters, his animal characters even adorn a series of Portmerion china.

But the exploits of Russell and the expressions of the various sheep characters in his first picture book go far beyond anything Scotton's accomplished previously. Within just one of the book's first illustrations ("...night fell and the sheep got ready for bed."), you have Russell prancing atop a tree while one sheep is brushing its teeth, one is holding a steaming mug of cocoa, one is heavy-eyed and clutching a teddy bear, and one old lady sheep (wearing spectacles and an old-fashioned night hat) is lying under a quilt with four feet straight up in the air and a glass containing a solution and her false teeth beside her.

Russell goes through all sorts of delightful misadventures trying to get to sleep. And then, by the end of the story when everyone is getting up (Granny putting in her teeth, another sheep reading the Daily Bleat), Russell, of course, is fast asleep.

Good night, Russell!

Richie Partington
http://richiespicks.com
BudNotBuddy@aol.com ( )

Pictures are super cute, but text is just okay. There's no real rhythm to it--it feels all over the place. ( )

Russell the sheep is trying to got to sleep, but try as he might it's just not happening... Meet the insomniac sheep and his froggy friend in this hilarious bedtime tale that comes complete with a very noisy ending! ( )

I love this sheep! ( )

Kirkus Reviews
Scotton makes a stylish debut with this tale of a sleepless sheep-depicted as a blocky, pop-eyed, very soft-looking woolly with a skinny striped nightcap of unusual length-trying everything, from stripping down to his spotted shorts to counting all six hundred million billion and ten stars, twice, in an effort to doze off. Not even counting sheep . . . well, actually, that does work, once he counts himself. Dawn finds him tucked beneath a rather-too-small quilt while the rest of his flock rises to bathe, brush and riffle through the Daily Bleat. Russell doesn't have quite the big personality of Ian Falconer's Olivia, but more sophisticated fans of the precocious piglet will find in this art the same sort of daffy urbanity. Quite a contrast to the usual run of ovine-driven snoozers, like Phyllis Root's Ten Sleepy Sheep, illustrated by Susan Gaber (2004). (Picture book. 6-8) ( )