Power Down, Little Robot

Power Down, Little Robot
written by Anna Staniszewski
illustrated by Tim Zeltner
published by Henry Holt / Macmillan (2015)
Roar Score: 4/5

Books starring robots have an almost unfair advantage with me, but I think it’s safe to say that this one is succeeds on its own.

The conceit with Power Down, Little Robot is nothing remarkably new … but it has ROBOTS! Little Robot doesn’t want to go to bed, so he does everything in his power to delay the inevitable. Mom Unit (yes, that’s the mother’s name) is not amused and keeps trying to get Little Robot into bed.

Mom Unit will brook no argument about another can of oil, just one more bedtime manual, or nightmares about error messages. She needs Little Robot to enter sleep mode.

This is an adorable little book with a clever twist from a first-time picture book author. The vocabulary (such as the terms used above, plus words like millisecond, manufactured, circuits, and stalling program) might fly over the heads of the very youngest kids, but nothing here is really beyond a simple explanation if they ask.

“All right now,” she says. “You must recharge.”

“But I am not tired! Look. My power level is still at yellow.”

Mom Unit turns off the light. The situation is becoming serious.

How can you not love text like that?

And not since Wall-E have you seen such an adorable little robot. Zeltner turns the cuteness up to 11 here, but you’ll get no argument from me…or my kids.

If they look like this little guy, I, for one, welcome our robot overlords.