Between a Wink and a Dream

A husband-and-wife team (creators of Saturdays with Ana Alicia Felicia) here introduces Theodora Thatcher Rabbit, an art- and nature-worshipping, adventurous Auntie Mame of a mother who heads a large and gifted brood. Ostensibly a tribute by her son, Thaddeus G. Rabbit, this willfully odd, bewitching and disjointed book presents a series of vignettes of family life. In one, the family watches from the shadows as a little rabbit ""practiced her ballet,/ going point on paws for the first miraculous seconds/ beneath the moon that was her first spotlight""; in another, Theodora fills jars with such fragrances as ""Very First Chill"" and ""Random Memory of Mother."" Whether Telford's watercolors beam with golden light or rustle with lavender shadows, their whimsy keeps the family's adulation of Bach, Einstein and the Great Invisible All Seeing All Being Rabbit on a convivial note. The rabbits tumble over one another in play, and touches like a rabbit version of Matisse's The Dance or a book called Euro Hutch (for reference as the little ones burrow) encourage readers to pore over the paintings. The dramatic rapture with which Theodora thanks the moon and stars ""for the tremendous work they were doing"" resembles that of an overwrought stage actress, but it's still easy to get swept up in Theodora's kite-flying, chapeau-wearing, moon-worshipping--and very fertile--life. All ages. (Sept.)