OCEAN WHISPER/SUSURRO DEL OÉANO

A young boy, his room decorated with a poster of whales hanging next to his small fish tank, prepares for sleep listening to a seashell, feeding his fish and staring meditatively into space. As he dreams, the fish leave the tank, the whales swim off his poster and he becomes a mer-boy, joining the underwater world for a night of freedom. Rockhill precedes his wordless picture book with a free-verse poem (in both English and Spanish) that sums up in a general fashion what follows. Rockhill’s main illustrations are richly colored, detailed and well executed, but are also heightened in a way not unlike idealized scenes from greeting cards or Thomas Kinkade’s paintings. Each is accompanied by three smaller pencil illustrations providing subplot information. Skillful but overly sentimental, the artwork will appeal to some and turn others away. (Picture book. 4-7)