Looking for Atlantis

Thompson's ( The Paper Bag Prince ) haunting picture book is both serious and witty. The deceptively simple story opens with the death of the young narrator's grandfather, a raffish sailor. Responding to the death, Titanic the parrot says, ``Hello, sailor,'' a contrary comment that sets up the narrator's contrarily successful search for mythical Atlantis. It is all around, Grandfather has said: ``You have to learn how to look for it.'' Look the boy does, through a dense, Escher-like world where everyday objects (walls, books, cellars) yield a treasure trove of apparently infinite (and often hilarious) surprises. The boy's quest begins through a little door at the bottom of Grandfather's trunk; the story line follows the classic hero cycle, with its obligatory dark night of the soul and ultimate emergence into self-discovery. Thompson's hero has added the power of imagination to the straightforward ability to see, and the author/artist accordingly glosses his tale with immensely satisfying art--intricate, colorful, joyous. Does the boy find Atlantis? Asked literally, the question is beside the point; in a mythic sense, however, it is the point, and one exceptionally well made. All ages. (Apr.)