The Night Before Christmas

by Clement C Moore, Lauren Semmer (Illustrator)

Overview

A fresh and contemporary adaptation of a beloved Christmas classic from New York Times bestselling children's book creator Lauren Semmer.

Merry Christmas to all and to all a goodnight!

On Christmas Eve night, a family has set out cookies and milk for a special visitor while a delightful winter cityscape dazzles outside. Though a city never quite sleeps, the family inside—including the cat—are all snuggled up tight. But when a clatter wakes up one child and they glimpse St. Nick’s sleigh and eight reindeer from the window a magical meeting occurs.

New York Times bestselling illustrator Lauren Semmer reimagines a holiday favorite with her signature vibrant and playful art, perfect for families to read and pore over during the Christmas season. ,

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780063373594
Publisher:	HarperCollins
Publication date:	09/16/2025
Pages:	40
Product dimensions:	9.00(w) x 11.00(h) x (d)
Age Range:	4 - 8 Years

About the Author

Clement C. Moore (1779–1863), an American scholar and poet, first wrote “The Night Before Christmas” in 1822 to entertain his children. A friend submitted it to a local newspaper, the Troy Sentinel, where it was published on December 23, 1823. Moore’s delightful description of St. Nicholas and his eight flying reindeer has since become the definitive portrait of Santa Claus.

Lauren Semmer is an artist, children’s book creator, and designer whose work has been featured everywhere from textile designs and children’s apparel to the New York Times, the Washington Post, and Real Simple magazine. She has illustrated several picture books, including the NYT bestselling title The ABCs of Black History and The ABCs of Women’s History, both written by Rio Cortez, and the CCBC Choices selection To Boldly Go: How Nichelle Nichols and Star Trek Helped Advance Civil Rights, by Angela Dalton. Her author-illustrator debut is Poppy’s Family Patterns. Her favorite holiday tradition is decorating festive cookies for Santa. Visit her at laurensemmer.com.

Editorial Reviews

Fans will adore sharing this oversized, traditional treatment of the beloved Christmas poem. A delectable holiday treat.” — Kirkus Reviews

From the Publisher

Long’s inclusive take on Moore’s poem focuses on four different families in four diverse dwellings....Details in the warm and expansive acrylic and colored-pencil illustrations clearly delineate each setting as well as draw viewers in and keep them riveted.

Horn Book (starred review)

★ 2020-08-18
A visual treatment of an old poem that’s both nostalgic and fresh.

The cover art focuses on St. Nick driving his airborne sleigh against the full moon. Flying reindeer pulling the sleigh break the cover’s right edge, leading into the book. The illustrations’ soft style establishes an old-fashioned look. Long’s central artistic conceit is revealed at the bottom of the picture, where he establishes four settings that Santa visits: a cityscape, a farm, a trailer park, and a palm-tree–dotted neighborhood. It’s refreshing to see artistic acknowledgement of Christmastime outside of snowy, rural, Rockwellian settings, and the endpapers show characters to be as diverse as their homes: an interracial sibling pair decorates a tree; a child who appears Black drafts a letter to Santa; two brown-skinned children draw a large fireplace scene; and three White-appearing children, one using a wheelchair, make cookies. The “right jolly old elf” himself is decidedly elfin, with a diminutive stature, and presents White with a ruddy complexion. In keeping with other versions, parents are depicted as the “I” of the text, and Long maintains his commitment to inclusion and diversity in their characterization as he switches among settings to show them encountering Santa. These shifts don’t follow a rigid sequence, and seasonal details in décor (several crèche scenes, stockings, trees, and even a menorah on the mantelpiece in the evidently bicultural urban home) offer additional visual interest.

Bring this one ho-ho-home. (Picture book. 2-7)

Kirkus Reviews