ALVAH AND ARVILLA

For 31 years Arvilla has wanted to see the Pacific Ocean, but her husband Alvah, a practical, 19th-century New England farmer and man of few words, says, ``You can't have a farm and travel.'' So, for 31 years Arvilla and Alvah stay home, until one day Arvilla has an idea: to build a house on wheels, put all their animals in it, and bring the entire farm with them. After careful thought, Alvah says, ``Ayuh.'' So they build their land-roving arc—Arvilla likes to think of it as a ``voiture''—and set off, accompanied by Betty, Blossom et al., their cows, sheep, cats, and dogs, and by their hens (although the hens, ``being very plural, were unnamed''). They travel across prairies and deserts (that will one day become Oklahoma and Arizona) and eventually reach the Pacific Ocean where, ``observing local custom, they all lay on the beach while Arvilla wrote postcards.'' When they finally return home, Arvilla brings a little of the beach back with her. Brightly illustrated in watercolors, Ray's (A Rumbly Tumbly Glittery Gritty Place, not reviewed) tale is imaginative and humorous. (Fiction/Picture book. 5-8)