Counting on Snow

In this petite counting book, striking oil compositions feature groups of animals in an increasingly snowy Arctic. On the flip side of each page, Newhouse portrays the same animal ensembles in mid-movement, as though exiting the tableaus. Alliterative gerunds describe each scene: a sculptural tower of rocks is a perch for "8 ravens raving" amid snow flurries, and on the following page, the flock lifts off. In another spread, four white hares huddle before withdrawing into the storm, and when a single moose, "silent in the falling snow," disappears, the next frame is filled with only flecks of blizzard white. A sparse and lovely meditation on winter wilderness. Ages 2–5. (Nov.)