Run, Dog!

French artist Boyer's (Woof Meow Tweet-tweet) nearly wordless combination of ice-cream colors, crisp silhouettes, and varied page sizes makes for distinctive visual storytelling. A dog is seen chasing a red rubber ball that lands on a playground trampoline where two silhouetted children are poised mid-bounce. A series of three partial pages, graduated from narrow to wide, shows the ball bouncing along with the delighted children, and each semi-page turn reveals new action in an effect akin to flipbook-style animation. Six of these narrow-wider-widest sequences appear, and each ends with a spread that shows the dog leaping after the ball as it creates more disruption. It bounces off to bonk a boy on the head as he picnics with his family, and similar sequences follow the dog and the ball as they scare a flock of pigeons, harass a zookeeper, and even provoke a fistfight. Discovering the dog's unassuming owner is the payoff, but the greatest interest is found in the almost forensic analysis Boyer performs on chaotic events as she breaks them down into separate, intelligible pieces. Ages 3%E2%80%935. (Mar.)