DOGTEAM

The author and his wife celebrate their longtime avocation of training sled dogs (Gary Paulsen has twice run the Iditarod). The text—crisp phrases, peremptory as barks, contrast with lyrical descriptions of the dogs' single-minded dedication to rushing onward—follows one glorious moonlit run, from harnessing and setting the dogs free ("The dance. Through the trees, in and out, the sled whipping after them through the trees with no sound but the song of the runners, the high-soft-shusshh-whine of the runners") to the return home and the dogs, still in harness, singing ("Did you did you did you did you.../Did you want it to last forever?"). Ruth Paulsen's individualized, delicately drawn dogs are all tension and action, beautifully set off by a more generalized watercolor background of forest, snow, and sky. An inspired collaboration vividly re-creating an exhilarating experience. (Picture book. 4+)