Hannah's Night by Komako Sakai (Gecko Press)

This book seems to have arrived on our doorstep just as Charlotte has decided that sleep is for wimps, and we've had some seriously disrupted nights (summertime sucks, too light to sleep, too hot, too fidgety etc).

This is a lovely book though, and it starts out with a little girl waking up in the middle of the night (sounds too familiar!) and, though surprised it's still dark, investigating her house.

Her older sister is completely zonked out. The only other soul awake in the house is the superbly named moggy Shiro.

Hannah decides that it's the perfect opportunity to do lots of things she likes to do (but isn't always allowed to). She goes for a wee (as does Shiro)...then cheekily creeps down to the fridge to raid it for cherries (and to make sure Shiro gets a nice dish of milk, of course!)

She checks on mum and dad, and then 'borrows' some of her sister's things to play with.

It sounds like a fairly ordinary story (but how I wish Charlotte would quietly creep around the house at night if she wakes up before finally drifting off gently to sleep rather than shouting "I NEED A POO!" at the top of her voice on the baby monitor) but the skill is in the way Komako Sakai captures Hannah and her night-time world so utterly perfectly, with the most deft strokes of her chalk and charcoal drawings.

Utterly cute. Hopefully reading this before bedtime won't give your little ones ideas though!

Charlotte's best bit: Shiro's fierce look of cat-concentration when having a pee. Oh...kay!

Daddy's favourite bit: A superb story told from the perspective of a restless toddler, so perfectly captured by Komako. Divine!

(Kindly sent to us for review by Gecko Press)