TIME FOR BED

A gentle litany of good nights, ostensibly from various animals to their young ("It's time for bed, little mouse, little mouse,/Darkness is falling all over the house") but mostly more apposite to their human counterparts ("It's time for bed, little calf, little calf,/What happened today that made you laugh?"), ending, inevitably, with a human mother tucking in a child. Fox's couplets seem offhand compared to her best (e.g., Shoes from Grandpa, 1990); but some of Dyer's expansive double-spread watercolors are charming; their points of view are so close in that some animals appear life-size (the bees are oversize). Best are the shaggy, drowsy, contented ewe and her lamb; repeated on the jacket, they guarantee a constant audience for this appealing bedtime book. (Picture book. 2-6)