The Oak Tree

From six o'clock one morning to six o'clock the next, the oak tree in this book is center stage to many activities punctuated by time. The sun and the moon, the rain and the rainbow, the squirrel and the possum, the cow and the bat, the baby bird and the owl are all present. People, too, are participants: at high noon, the tree is used as a picnic site; later as an observation post; then a traveler spends the night under the tree's branches, resuming his journey at daybreak. Like Coats's first work, Marcella and the Moon, this is a gratifying book, eloquent in its simplicity. The rolling landscape of the oak tree makes real and completes the story of this little world, in paintings where small details subtly highlight the shifting light of a day's passing. Ages 3-6. (March)