Little Pig, Bigger Trouble

A disastrous journey to deliver blueberry birthday cake lays the foundation for this amusingly quirky picture book. When Pierre and his good friend Henri the pig meet a sweet-toothed cow along their route, events take a sudden turn for the worse, and it seems that they will never reach their destination--certainly not with cake intact. Sunny watercolors in muted sepia tones--highlighted here and there with greenery--detail country life in all its eccentricity, and inquisitive round-faced characters (both animal and human) abound. Translated from the German, the text has a sing-song rhythm that belies a sly humor--``and in the field was a cow, and in the cow was a stomach, and the cow's stomach was hungry.'' The bird's eye perspectives add an interesting dimension to this beguiling picture book. Ages 3-up. (May)