Water's Way

Snug indoors during winter, Tony hopes for snow. While he waits, climatic changes mirror changes inside his house. Steam from a pot of soup hits a cool window pane and clouds the glass; moist sea air rises, cools and forms clouds. Finally, the air turns cold: a fogged window becomes covered with frost, and water in the clouds freezes into ice crystals. Tony wakes to greet a white world. This companion volume to The Sun, the Wind and the Rain is not quite as successful in its attempt to show a child's world as a microcosm of nature. The equations here are a bit forced: for instance, liquid soap squeezed into Tony's bath is likened to a creek reaching and blending into the open sea. Peters's ( Good Morning, River! ; Tania's Trolls ) prose is, for the most part, clear and concise, and Rand's paintings are typically striking in their depictions of natural forces. Their combined efforts, however, are at times confusing--as when the text describes the steamy window as being ``covered . . . with a foggy curtain,'' and the illustration depicts Tony pulling aside an actual curtain, thin and filmy. The book may raise more questions than it answers. Ages 4-7. (May)