Daydreams for Night

This collection of 13 vignettelike stories from first-time author Southworth, accompanied by Ouimet’s haunting b&w illustrations, follows in the tradition of Shaun Tan’s Tales of Outer Suburbia and Chris Van Allsburg’s The Mysteries of Harris Burdick. The stories take place in settings and circumstances that are slightly, sometimes disconcertingly, tweaked. In one, a librarian doesn’t notice when a sunflower blossoms out of his head; in another, 10-year-old Ester, who sells more cookies than any other Brownie, retires to her room for three years after trying to sell cookies to a ghostly individual at a funeral home (in the full-spread image that follows, Ester totes a wagon-full of cookies across a great lawn, peering back at the estate as birds swarm overhead). Each story stands on its own, yet they are connected through a shared enigmatic quality, offering up intriguing possibilities over explanations. Ages 8–12. (Feb.)