HORACE

Every night, his tiger mother tells Horace that ``We chose you...because you had lost your first family...We liked your spots, and we wanted you to be our child.'' Still, Horace feels the need of stripes; later, he seeks out a family with spots like his and enjoys their company, but then realizes that his striped parents and relations are his real family: ``Mama, if you chose me, can I choose you, too?'' The warmth and security from which Horace ventures forth to discover the relationship between his roots and his allegiances is confirmed in every deftly chosen word of Keller's simple text and each line of her affectionate, carefully composed illustrations. Some adoptive families may feel that ``lost'' is not the mot juste to explain what happened to birth parents; otherwise, a notably perceptive, reassuring story. (Picture book. 3-8)