cover image THE HUGS & KISSES CONTEST

THE HUGS & KISSES CONTEST

Paul F. Kortepeter, , illus. by Susan Wheeler. . Dutton, $14.99 (25pp) ISBN 978-0-525-46531-7

Wheeler and Kortepeter, who previously collaborated on Tea with Victoria Rose and The Happiest Season of All, create a valentine for parent and child, featuring the rabbit matron Victoria Rose Boxwood and her two children, Oliver and Emily. When sailor-suited Oliver becomes jealous of his mother's affection for his sister, Emily declares, "Whoever gets the most hugs and kisses from Momma before the sun goes down is her favorite child." And the contest begins. Emily has the perfect-child act down pat, but each attempt by Oliver to score points (and thus hugs and kisses) with his mother is comically thwarted: gathering peaches to make a cobbler, he falls out of a tree and sprains his cottontail. "I'm wounded, Mama," he whines, when a friendly rabbit doctor brings him home. Mama, the very picture of turn-of-the-century maternal devotion in her petticoat and bloomers, declares that both children are special. Wheeler's sentimental stylings may not be to everyone's taste, but her meticulous eye for detail and subtle visual verve rescue the pictures from preciousness. Likewise, Kortepeter's narrative glimmers with gentle wit (Emily is characterized by Oliver as "the hug thief"; and when he spots his mother giving her a kiss, "Suddenly it seemed to Oliver as if a dark cloud had crept into his blue sky"). This appealingly old-fashioned-feeling volume features French-fold pages and embossing both within the illustrations and along the margins. Ages 4-up. (Jan.)