A review by backonthealex
Before Morning by Joyce Sidman

5.0

An ordinary cold winter's day, a walk through the park and along the street with mom and the dog, eating dinner as a family with mom and dad, mom reading a bedtime story, then folding the laundry before she leaves for work as an airplane pilot...But maybe, just this once, if it is said just the right way and using just the right words, a wished for snowstorm might just bring mom back home. Written in rhyme, Sidman employed the literary device of invocation for expressing the young girl's wish for snow and her mom's return: "Let the air turn to feathers/the earth turn to sugar/and all that is heavy/be light." What is invocation? Sidman includes a note On Wishes and Invocations. How powerful are words? she asks, and what would you wish for? I loved that it is the mom who is the pilot, and the dad who stays home with their daughter. Beth Krommes watercolor illustrations done on scratchboard in a palette of wintery browns, golds, and blues with touches of other color (like winter itself). Using the scratchboard technique really gives each illustration so much depth and texture. This is a charming story where the art and the rhyme really come together so beautifully in this heartwarming family story.