Boo and Baa in a Party Mood

Boo and Baa are an endearing pair of wide-eyed lambs with an unspecified relationship, although brother and sister is a good bet. In Party Mood, the lambs get ready for a birthday party at their friend Bob's house; in Windy Weather, Boo and Baa struggle to get their groceries home in the thick of a snowstorm. The appeal of these ostensibly simple books lies in the nuanced presentation. The Landstroms (Will's New Cap) wield a deceptively cute cartoon drawing style (they could easily be Scandinavia's answer to Sandra Boynton) to capture a wide range of attitudes and expressions--Boo and Baa are lively, dynamic figures, even when their faces are obscured by winter stocking caps. The Landstroms also have a talent for imbuing their bare-bones stories with funny narrative fillips; for example, Boo must practice his dancing before going to the party, but gets so discombobulated by the dizzying music that he ends up exhausted and prostrated on the floor. This shows all the promise of a winning series, with one caveat: the language lacks oomph--it's hard to tell whether something was lost in translation from the original Swedish, or whether words are simply not the Landstroms' strong suit. Ages 1-4. (Sept.)