No More Bedtime!

by Chuck Richards

Overview

A vibrantly illustrated picture book about an inventive boy who hates bedtime, so he decides to build a top-secret machine that would put an end to it once and for all!

Elliot doesn't like bedtime. It always comes before he is finished with his day! He constantly creates new inventions to outwit his parents and stay up later—like the MEGA-BOOK 5000 and the PILLOW-COPTER 5000.

Nothing works, until Elliot has a brainstorm. This flash of genius leads to the ultimate machine that can keep the sun from setting for as long as Elliot wants.

But is a never-ending day as amazing as it has always seemed?

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780553535631
Publisher:	Random House Children's Books
Publication date:	12/10/2019
Sold by:	Random House
Format:	eBook
Pages:	40
Lexile:	NC760L (what's this?)
File size:	26 MB
Note:	This product may take a few minutes to download.
Age Range:	3 - 7 Years

About the Author

Chuck Richards is the author and illustrator of Jungle Gym Jitters, Critter Sitter, and Lulu's Magic Wand. He is a professor of art at Iowa State University, where he coordinates the core drawing curriculum for the College of Design and teaches courses in sequential narrative drawing. He lives in Ames, Iowa. For more on Chuck, visit him at chuckrichardsbooks.com.

Editorial Reviews

2019-07-28
A whiz-kid comes up with an invention to stop time.

Elliot hates how bedtime stops his fun every day, so he creates zany inventions to slow the progression of time. His exasperated parents punish him with an even earlier bedtime, telling him, "Because at the end of the day, son, it's time to go to bed." This curt rationale leads Elliot to dream up an invention to make "a day that never ends." He researches a plan with the unwitting school librarian, Mr. Takaki, who explains how the Earth spins on its axis to create the movement from day to night. Inspired, Elliot creates the Sun-Snagger 5000 with magnets, balloons, and a windmill with the hours marked on its vanes in his backyard. Readers must suspend a lot of disbelief to accept that the rickety, homemade contraption stops the Earth's rotation, achieving his goal of stopping time. At first, Elliot is delighted by the never-ending day, but he soon realizes that an eternal day means no more birthdays, or holidays, or growing up. So he simply turns off the invention, delivering an anticlimactic end to the story, which is weakly remedied by his little sister's sly, final-page invention to create an eternal night. Elliot and his family present white in the stiff illustrations, which verge on caricature.

Something of a snooze. (Picture book. 4-7)

Kirkus Reviews