Dear Little Lamb,

Posing as an innocuous pen pal, a wolf aims to befriend and then eat Little Lamb, the ""small, white, fluffy thing"" he has spied through his telescope from his mountaintop home. Wolf's first missive begins, ""Won't you be my friend? I'm really very lonely. Please write back soon.... P.S. If you could, please put a small sausage in the envelope when you write back to me."" All the action occurs on the emerald green mountain against an azure sky (though when the Wolf's in the picture, gray clouds abound). Wolf's green lookout tower sits at the top, halfway down is the post office, manned by an old curmudgeonly dog, and the sheep family makes its outdoor home in a green pasture in the valley. Bright accents lend a playful air to the story (e.g., the sheeps' pasture includes a bright red sofa beneath a mustard yellow umbrella). In Weldin's spreads, Wolf's menacing posture and yellow eyes (and his cane made from a sheep's leg bone) contrast with the dewy, innocent stare of Little Lamb. Mama Sheep puts an end to the correspondence when she sees Wolf's revelatory remark about ""the many delicious sheep that live in Australia."" And, in the somewhat anti-climactic and convenient conclusion, the sheep move to another continent. Older readers will easily transfer the book's message to a more updated scenario of modern-day predators and Internet chat rooms, while a younger audience will rest assured, knowing the problem of the unscrupulous letter writer is conquered by vigilant parents. Ages 3-up.