Children have been lulled to sleep for years by this poem which recounts the voyage of Wynken, Blynken a nd Nod, who set off to sail in a wooden shoe. Johanna Wester man sets her picture book interpretation of this poem in a m oonlit Dutch landscape. '

Reviews

ea. vol: unpaged. (Pudgy Pals Board Bks.). Grosset. Feb. 1986. BD $3.95. PreS Three board books that present stories telescoped to fit the 16-page format. Chicken Little and her friends are spared the consequences of their own foolishness and gullibility when the king rides up and scares off the fox, leaving the chicken with a silly umbrella with which to ward off acorns. Wynken, Blynken, and Nod is the only text to escape surgery. Field's sentimental bedtime poem is presented in its entirety but illustrated in electric colors and a quasi-colonial setting. Peter Rabbit omits incidents from the last third of Potter's original story, while illustrations depict on one double-page spread what Potter leisurely and gracefully pictured on four or five pages. Two of the titles attempt to clarify and unscarify classic tales in an effort to present them to the very young, but why bother? In a few years, they'll be ready for the real things, available in so many other versions. Susan Hepler, Windsor Public Library, Conn.

Inspired by Field's bedtime poem with its night sky of ``twinkling foam,'' Westerman (The Gingham Dog and the Calico Cat) conjures forth an eerie, luminous sea- and skyscape, aglitter with splendid silver ``herring fish'' stars. Three children and their cat enact the roles of Field's fishermen as they sail off in a wooden shoe boat, its sail made from a patched sheet. While not surrealistic, the characters and setting are thoroughly dreamlike. The artist's predominantly blue-green palette influences not only the pictures of the sea and moon, but also the children's faces. They stare like ghostly sleepwalkers, their countenances reflecting the blue of the sky, while the crater-mottled moon floats off through the sea's ruffled waves. The night-as-sea illustrations echo the imagery of the text, but Westerman adds more action with the children returning home, anchoring their boat to the chimney and climbing through a gabled window to their bed. Westerman's inventive design elements (the real bedroom's quilt and decor are similar to the visual motifs in the dreamscape) provide a soothing accompaniment for the familiar text, a staple for bedtime reading. Ages 3-6. (Sept.)