IT’S SIMPLE, SAID SIMON

In sketchy, expressive watercolors, So (Tasty Baby Belly Buttons, 1999, etc.) deftly shifts the scene from city sidewalk to jungle path as a strolling lad takes on more and more difficult challenges from animals met along the way. Simon has no trouble growling like a dog (“It’s simple”), stretching like a cat, or even jumping like a horse, but escaping a tiger after he’s climbed onto its back isn’t quite so easy. So gives the tale an indeterminate Asian locale, with brushwork and figure placement evocative of traditional Chinese art, though boy and beast look at least somewhat Indian. Not that this matters: it’s an original tale, written in plain, but rhythmic language that begs to be read aloud, and features a self-confident lad as capable of getting himself out of trouble as into it. Cleverness saves Simon in the end: he tricks the tiger into taking him into a river, and swims away. Readers who never have liked the way the Gingerbread Boy meets his end will be pleased by Simon’s escape—easily. (Picture book. 6-8)