Fish Eyes: A Book You Can Count on

"If you could truly have a wish, would you wish to be a fish?" This question, posed at the end of Ehlert's ( Chicka Chicka Boom Boom ) latest, typically tropical-hued offering, will be answered with resounding affirmatives from captivated readers. In deepest ocean waters (midnight-blue pages) swim gaudy denizens of the deep, waiting to be enumerated by the child who "could put on a suit of scales, add some fins and one of these tails." Counting has seldom been so painlessly presented, and each page incorporates a simple arithmetic lesson, as the aquatic voyager adds him- or herself to the marine groupings. Ehlert's sense of fun is surpassed here only by her sense of color: in brilliant greens, purples, oranges and pinks--to name but a few--she presents in lighthearted rhyme an amazing, appealing aquarium. For enjoyment and education, Fish Eyes can be counted on indeed. Ages 4-8. (Mar.)

PreS-Gr 1-- Stylized fish shapes in flat, razzle-dazzle colors against a dark blue background float across the pages from one to ten, accompanied by one little dark fish who keeps the count going. Cutout circles at the eyes reveal colors on succeeding pages. The slight text, occasionally in rhyme, introduces adjectives through the count, and tries to set a context of wish-fulfillment. It's a slick production, attempting several concepts at once--numbers, shapes, colors, imagining, addition to a value of one--but it doesn't quite hang together, and its result is a little breathless. MacDonald and Oakes' Numblers (Dial, 1988) also uses strong color and stark form to present visually the concepts of increasing quantity and transformations, but in a more thoughtful and well-integrated way, with movement inherent in the design. Another little dark fish, Lionni's Swimmy (Pantheon, 1963), has a more meaningful underwater exploration, incorporating the idea of changing appearances into the story. --Karen Litton, London Public Libraries, Ontario, Canada