cover image Steam Train, Dream Train 1-2-3

Steam Train, Dream Train 1-2-3

Sherri Duskey Rinker, illus. by Tom Lichtenheld. Chronicle, $7.99 (20p) ISBN 978-1-4521-4914-1

This spin-off of Rinker and Lichtenheld’s bestselling Steam Train, Dream Train takes readers from one to 10 as they check out the activities taking place in a string of train cars. The events pictured in Lichtenheld’s humorously detailed images aren’t always terribly sleep-inducing—three rabbits bounce on a bed, four turtles pretend to drive race cars on a rack—but Rinker’s soothing rhymes exert a steady, calming presence: “Two squirrels stack six balls up high,/ two other balls go flying by,” she writes as kangaroos play basketball in a hopper car. Available simultaneously: Steam Train, Dream Train Colors. Up to age 2. Agent: Amy Rennert, Amy Rennert Agency. (Mar.)