RED BERRY WOOL

A simple, sweet story about care, friendship, and literal-mindedness. A boy watches a flock of sheep on a farm with the red barns and checkerboard fields of long ago. Lalo, the very smartest lamb, loves the boy’s berry-red wool sweater, which Lalo’s mother says comes from their very own wool. Lalo wants his wool to look like that, and his mother tells him the steps for making a sweater, which Lalo memorizes: “Wash the wool. Spin it. Dye the wool. Knit it.” Lalo tries to wash his wool in the pond, spins himself over a slope, tries to dye the wool by rolling in the berries far from home, and ends up thorn-covered and bitten by a snake. The boy always rescues Lalo, and when Lalo’s mother tells him that “Knit means to bring things together,” the smart lamb settles down next to the boy for storytelling and sunset-watching. The bright, clear acrylics of Coffey’s debut are wonderfully textured, while the images are full of pattern and sunlight, as homespun and decorative as a well-loved quilt. Funny, touching, and evocative. (Picture book. 4-8)