ZAP! CLAP! BOOM!

The buildup and arrival of a wild thunderstorm offers both eye-widening drama and lessons in atmospheric phenomena.

Three gracefully posed children, the eldest slightly darker-skinned than the younger pair, and a trio of goats cavort over island hills until a squall rises in the distance and sweeps violently in before they then venture outside again to enjoy a world made “dazzling, / sparkling, / fresher.” Blending paper collage and digital paint, MacKay artfully captures the changing light on steep meadows as a “blue-forever day” gradually darkens under heavy, windswept clouds that “hover over, / tower, / loom, / then… // ZAP! CLAP! BOOM!” before at last melting away to leave a sunny, washed world. For the story behind the storm, Salas switches from free verse to prose in the backmatter to explain in specific detail how cumulus clouds, various kinds of lightning, and thunder are produced before closing with leads to useful weather-related sites, books, and even time-lapse videos on the web. Arthur Geisert’s Thunderstorm (2013) portrays a more massive tempest as a rural catastrophe; here, the swirling wind, torrential rain, and crashes of lightning are seen as a safely exciting but brief interlude in an otherwise serene setting. (This book was reviewed digitally.)

A crashing success.