Delight sparkles throughout Sang-Keun Kim's Star Fishing, a picture book import from South Korea smoothly translated by Ginger Ly. A bunny-suit-clad child, wide awake in a shadowy bedroom, reveals, "It's the kind of night when you just can't fall asleep. You feel as though everyone in the world is asleep but you." The child ventures downstairs (losing slippers on the steps), past an open door where parents slumber, to gaze out a window brightened by a crescent moon: "Oh, I see a light! Is somebody awake?" The child dashes outside, yelling upward, "Play with meeeeeee..." when "something marvelous happens" and a star on a string appears.
Little Rabbit-on-the-moon pulls the gleeful child up with a magic pole. Together, the pair continue star fishing, gathering other insomnolent adventurers: Crab from the sea, Fox from the forest, Big Bear and Little Bear from the Arctic. The stars, it turns out, aren't sleepy either, and readily provide a glittering playground. Realizing that their nocturnal escapades can't last forever, the empathic child and friends leave behind twinkling memories to ensure Little Rabbit won't be lonely. And then the child's eyelids begin to droop....
Kim's dreamy tale is a timeless balm for those all-too-familiar nights of elusive sleep. Kim's mixed-media night skies, whimsically presented in palettes of mostly blues and golds, might emphasize the smallness of the characters, but the placement of the companions cleverly underscores their closeness. The child, Little Rabbit and their new friends offer a welcoming community in which the sleepless need not feel alone. --Terry Hong, Smithsonian BookDragon