True Companions
Companion books, series additions and sequels continue to bloom this spring. Guri and Gura, the mouse heroes of a bestselling Japanese series introduced to U.S. readers last fall, find a message in a bottle in Guri and Gura's Seaside Adventure by Reiko Nakagawa and Yuriko Yamawaki. Water safety instructors take note: these two learn how to swim only after they have floated in "swimming tubes" (lifesavers) to Pearl Lighthouse Island, where they meet a Sea Giant (a human). (Tuttle, $10.95 hardcover 32p ages 3-up ISBN 0-8048-3354-0; Apr.)
Tracing the further adventures of the duo introduced in Bubba and Beau Best Friends, Bubba and Beau Go Night-Night by Kathi Appelt, illus. by Arthur Howard, finds the two cavorting all around the town with cowboy-hatted Big Bubba in his big red truck. But when bedtime rolls around the two won't go to sleep, Big Bubba's got a time-honored trick up his sleeve (in which the truck also plays a part). (Harcourt, $16 32p ages 2-5 ISBN 0-15-204593-7; Apr.)
After reading and counting, the giraffe star discovers Carlo Likes Colors by Jessica Spanyol, the third in the series. Carlo sees a spectrum of colors in a variety of venues, including "brown in the woods" and "purple in the garden." Following the format of the previous titles, each color-specific spread, with one line of text ("Carlo sees yellow in the field"), features illustrations tagged with labels ("sun"; "buttercups"). (Candlewick, $14.99 32p ages 2-5 ISBN 0-7636-2023-8; Apr.)
Introduced in board books last year, the yellow dog YoYo is on the go-go in two lift-the-flap paperbacks, YoYo Goes Next Door and YoYo Goes to the Park, both by Jeannette Rowe. Vertical and horizontal gatefolds extend the action in the illustrations, which are almost Maisy-esque in their bright color and simplicity. (Tiger Tales, $5.95 each 18p ages 2-5 ISBN 1-58925-368-X; -369-8; Mar.)
Wacky multiple mysteries swirl around the family feline in Allan Ahlberg and Katharine McEwen's The Cat Who Got Carried Away, the third Gaskitt adventure (after The Man Who Wore All His Clothes and The Woman Who Won Things). Copious spot art, including a trio of annotated maps, helps keep the story moving at a quick clip. (Candlewick, $15.99 96p ages 6-9 ISBN 0-7636-2073-4; Apr.)
The Classics Corner Carl Sandburg's 1920 Rootabaga Stories and 1923 More Rootabaga Stories are back, in all their goofy read-aloud glory, in handsome cloth and paper reissues with interior illustrations by Maud and Miska Petersham. As the tales begin, Gimme the Ax's family sells everything they have—"pigs, pastures, pepper pickers, pitchforks"—and prepares to move as the neighbors speculate: "They are going to Kansas, to Kokomo, to Canada, to Kankakee, to Kalamazoo, to Kamchatka, to the Chattahoochee." (Harcourt Young Classics/Odyssey Classics, Stories: $17 192p ages 8-up ISBN 0-15-204709-3; $5.95 paper -204714-X; More Stories: $17 176p ages 8-up -204713-1; $5.95 paper -204706-9; Apr.)
Michael Hague illustrates three collections of time-proven tales. Originally published in 1910, Old Mother West Wind by Thornton W. Burgess introduces a group of enchanting woodland creatures, the Merry Little Breezes, Reddy Fox and Tommy Trout among them, to a new generation of readers. Michael Hague's Favorite Hans Christian Andersen Fairy Tales offers nine classic stories including The Snow Queen, Thumbelina and The Little Mermaid, all adapted by Jane Woodward. And lastly, Hague portrays the lush habitat of Toad, Mole, Rat and Badger in Kenneth Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. The handsomely designed oversize volumes present Hague's artwork in framed spreads and spot illustrations, just right for lap reading. (Holt, $18.95 each ages 6-up West Wind ISBN 0-8050-7238-1; Fairy Tales -7239-X; Willows $25.95 -7237-3; Apr.)
