The illustrations are detailed and sensuous. For instance you can almost smell the sweetness of the candy floss and popcorn pieces. And there’s plenty of visual humour, too, such as when one anxious bear hides its eyes during a scary dodgem-car ride. Spread from The Midnight Fair by Gideon Sterer and Mariachiara Di Giorgio LoveReading4Kids exists because books change lives, and buying books through LoveReading4Kids means you get to change the lives of future generations, with 25% of the cover price donated to schools in need. Join our community to get personalised book suggestions, extracts straight to your inbox, 10% off RRPs, and to change children’s lives.

Walker Books - The Midnight Fair

This book is so lovely. It takes the shared experience of a county fair for humans and turns it into something strange and wondrous. There are so many moments caught in the images here: a porcupine covered in sweets, a fawn managing to ride a carousel horse, a rabbit whizzing by on the swing ride, and a bear cub buying ice cream with acorns. One after another, the image I enjoyed seeing the animals having a ride on the teacups, swings, and pirate ship amongst other amusement rides, plus munching on the confectionary and hot dogs. They certainly look like they are enjoying themselves.

Lovely, sweet, funny. Just the thing for fans of anthropomorphized critters in children's stories, which is happily a lot of them. Wordless books well done are awesome, and this one is very well done. As Betsy Bird pointed out: the art is amazing. This is, I believe, the first time I have ever seen a separate author and illustrator listed on a wordless book, but it makes sense. Both through the richness of its illustrations and through the book’s depiction of an ‘in-between’ liminal space, The Midnight Fair creates a magical world where the boundary between humans and animals is, for one splendid fictional night, suspended. Spread from The Midnight Fair by Gideon Sterer and Mariachiara Di Giorgio

The Midnight Fair — Tim Warnes The Midnight Fair — Tim Warnes

Painting from close up, Di Giorgio creates the sense that viewers are part of the crowd, and bathes every spread in brilliant, theatrical light. - Publishers Weekly I am so thrilled to have won the Yoto Carnegie Medal, not only because it’s the award every children’s writer dreams about, but because it is so committed to promoting reading and sharing stories. Sharing stories is something I believe to be one of the most important parts of our lives, simply because stories are our lives. They are threads that connect us all. They make us understand, they give us a shared experience, and they give us something special and private too. They give us wild freedom and they give us safety and comfort.At the story’s heart (for me) is a message about the difference between the worlds of human and animal, where sometimes the human world encroaches so much on the animal world that interaction is inevitable. Sterer and Di Giorgio take a light hearted look at this idea in this book, but I feel like the story has a deeper message to send. In 2022, the judging panel includes 14 volunteer judges from CILIP’s Youth Libraries Group. Find out more about this year’s judges here With the help of a pair of crafty racoons, the funfair is suddenly brought to life. As if casting off their ‘wildness’ for one magical evening, the animals, now anthropomorphised, do everything the humans did earlier: buy popcorn, doughnuts, sweets and take part in the games and attractions, chase sugar-addled cubs and win huge cuddly versions of themselves. A young wolf cub, who looks slightly befuddled when it wins a goldfish, is particularly humorous, and a bearer of a poignant message for later.

The Midnight Fair by Gideon Sterer | Goodreads

Gideon Sterer is an American author whose books include Skyfishing, illustrated by Poly Bernatene, Not Your Nest, illustrated by Andrea Tsurumi, From Ed’s to Ned’s, illustrated by Ruth Cummins, and The Night Knights, illustrated by Cory Godbey, which has been optioned by Sony Pictures. Gideon grew up in the woods of upstate New York, where his parents owned a little zoo where he would run around after-hours and let the animals out. The carnival is in town and after it closes for the night a group of animals go to the circus and have the night of their lives. Yoto, the innovative, screen-free audio platform for children, is the headline sponsor for the awards. The awards are also proudly sponsored by Peters, the official book supplier; and ALCS, champions of authors’ rights.And for that, I’m thankful. Because out of that curious fascination came the most fantastic picture book, The Midnight Fair. He is a tutor for Arvon and Poetry School, and a Keats 2020 Poet in Residence at Keats House. Dean is based in Glasgow, and is Co-director of Scottish BAME Writers Network. Di Giorgio used to work as a storyboard artist, and it shows. Using unusual perspectives, she creates a cinematic feel to the reading experience. ‘Di Giorgio creates the sense that viewers are part of the crowd,’ writes Publishers Weekly, ‘and bathes every spread in brilliant, theatrical light.’

Shadowing Resources Yoto Kate Greenaway Shortlist

Thanks so much for your lovely message and for everything that you do with Book Wagon. Yourself and Bob are much cherished in our booky world and I personally really appreciate everything that you do. There is always something liberating and exciting about wordless picturebooks. The gap between what is represented and the meaning-making process opens up just enough for readers to invite a richness of interpretation. Transforming Sterer’s narrative into a wordless tale, Di Giorgio, creator of the highly acclaimed Professional Crocodile, presents us with the story of a troupe of animals and their nighttime excursions into an empty fairground. The winners were revealed in a lunchtime in-person ceremony at The British Library for the first time since 2019. It was hosted by award-winning poet and novelist Dean Atta and featured Chair of Judges, librarian Jennifer Horan, alongside a selection of the young people who officially shadowed the 2022 awards. Mariachiara Di Giorgio is an illustrator, storyboard artist and concept designer from Rome, Italy. She created her first picture book, the wordless Professional Crocodile, with writer Giovanna Zoboli in 2017.As with many wordless picture books, The Midnight Fairunfolds over a sequence of panels that recall comics/graphic novels. The fact that it is told without words is a great leveller: Pre-readers may be unable to handle the written word, but that doesn’t disqualify them as storytellers. And there’s plenty of detail in the visually stimulating Midnight Fairto spark the imagination. (The wordless nature of the story can also be considered an extension of the ‘silent spreads’ you sometimes find in picture books (for example, Where the Wild Things Are).) The two medal winners were chosen from a shortlist of 16 – eight for each medal – by an expert team of volunteer judges, featuring 14 librarians from CILIP’s Youth Libraries Group based across the UK. And imagine, if you would, forest creatures large and small, peering from the dense bushes and trees and watching all the activity, lights, fun, food, fabulous doings that the "fair" is to humans.