SPRING SONG

As Winter Lullaby (1998) gives way to a new season, snow melts from highlands, reeds grow in wetlands, new grass shoots up, and cottonwoods bud, signaling the reappearance of bears and skunks, the call of frogs, the construction of new nests and tunnels. Alternating double-paged spreads show the wide sweep of a setting, then the animal that lives in it. Newbold's landscapes and wildlife portraits, all rendered in crisp detail and strong, sculpted-looking lines, seem to explode past the edges of the page, matching the rhythmic force of Seuling's rhymed question and answer text: "When reeds grow across the marshy wetlands, what do bullfrogs do?" [turn the page] "Croak the light long / their mating song." Seuling and Newbold play this seasonal wake-up tune with nary a false note. (Picture book. 4-6)