AIRPORT

In the pictures, as in a frieze, children can see what happens when you take a plane trip. But the text is both as tum-de-dum and as literal—as mechanical, altogether—as that sentence. The visual drama, too, is mostly confined to the scenes of arrival: people getting off an airport bus and out of a cab; lining up at the ticket counter; milling about in the waiting room. And there is one little boy, first seen on the bus, to watch for as he makes his way finally onto the plane and into his seat. (The finale is of course takeoff—and the plane disappearing into the distance.) What is lacking is any projection of the experience from a child's point of view (we don't, for instance, go through baggage-clearance with the little boy, we just see him emerging into the waiting room)—as well as any information special to a plane trip ("Up front in the cockpit," typically, "the pilots get ready"). But what youngsters could do, beginning with the people on the bus, is to make up their own stories and explanations; if they've actually been on a plane trip, they could provide a running narrative: Barton's pictures are, as usual, cheerful, interestingly composed, and infused with a spark of life.