A Plane Goes Ka-zoom!

Having served up tributes to trucks and trains, London and Roche now turn their cataloging and categorizing talents to the machines of the air. As the images fly from airfields to polar regions to the wild blue yonder, readers can savor how planes' infinite variety encompasses not just job descriptions but also acoustic impact ("A plane goes clankety-clank./ A plane goes va-ROOM!/ A plane goes zippety-zooma./ A plane goes ka-ZOOM!") and physical characteristics ("A plane could be silver./ A plane could be blue,"/ A plane could have one propeller,/ or a plane could have two"). Roche's cheery naïf drawings, rendered with Crayola-box vibrancy, may not satiate a kindergarten-age gearhead's craving for detail. But preschoolers should find this book suitably encyclopedic and concur with all the doll-like smiling humans in these pages, that to know planes is indeed to love them. Ages 2–5. (Sept).