Celebrated Belgian children's author and illustrator Kitty Crowther, who received the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award in 2010, here presents three of her idiosyncratic but charming fairy-tales, all tied together through the storytelling of Mother Bear, who is attempting to get Little Bear to bed. In the first tale, the Night Guardian convinces all of the forest creatures to go to bed, before performing the ritual that allows her to fall asleep as well. In the second, a tiny elfin girl named Zhorra wanders through the wood with her sword and her blackberry, before being taken in for the night by her friend Jacko Mollo the bat. In the third and final tale, a little man named Bo, living in an owl's nest, has trouble getting to sleep until he visits the shore and, in the company of his friend Otto the otter, takes a soothing dip in the ocean...

I was surprised to see on the colophon of Stories of the Night that this delightful little tome was first published in Swedish, as Sagor om Natten. I know that Crowther is Belgian, and the only other title I have read from her, Scritch Scratch Scraww Plop, was originally published in French. Perhaps she is a polyglot? Whatever the case may be, I am glad I happened across this one at the library, as I found it delightful. Mother and Little Bear put me in mind of the similarly named Mother and Little Bear from the classic American early readers, written by Else Holmelund Minarik and illustrated by the immortal Maurice Sendak. The inset stories themselves were quirky and appealing, with a weird sense of charm, while the artwork, in which a bright pink shade predominates, was unexpectedly appealing. There's nothing natural about this color palette, and one might expect it to feel unfitting, in a depiction of the forest, but somehow the whole thing just works. ( )