KOMODO!

As in Martin/Gammell's Will's Mammoth (1989), reality turns to fantasy when a child is so fascinated by dragons that her parents take her to the Indonesian island of Komodo, where, escaping crowds of tourists, she wanders into the jungle and encounters a ten-foot monitor lizard—the Komodo dragon of her dreams. Sis's visual realization of this slight storyline is splendidly imaginative. On the opening spreads, the young enthusiast is already creating dragons from a rich variety of materials: sand, topiary, her own shadow. After a Waldo-style mob scene where she's identified by her dragon T-shirt, Sis depicts her sumptuous apartment, in tones of brown, as virtually a museum, crammed with dragon artifacts and images in contemporary media: fax, computer screen, etc. Bali's crowded tourist traps are drawn with satirical wit; the lush blue- green jungle, burgeoning with plants that all mimic benign lizards and dragons, is fascinating. A note adds a bit more about this rare ``survivor of the carnivorous dinosaurs.'' Lucid, elegantly rendered art with a wealth of intriguing details; wonderfully appealing subject. (Picture book. 4+)