On the Day the Horse Got Out

Visually stunning, highly imaginative, and delightfully baffling.

"On the day the horse got out,// the bells all rang,/ the birds flew south." The sun rises from billowing clouds, in this picture book, to find a white horse outside a fence, cropping lilies. The bells of the verse belong to other barnyard creatures: a cow with a bell around its neck dashes headlong across the page, alongside a cat with a steady gaze that sits astride a galloping, belled sheep. The sharp-edged wings of birds, meanwhile, echo petals and wind-tossed streamers also shown. The images and text that follow mix the everyday (a missing dog) and the fanciful (a sleeping dragon, a tiny room underground) while building a chaotic tension that never lets go. The horse's final leap into the unknown befits the surreal logic of nonsense verse and leaves behind a delicious sense of unsettling mystery. Creating a nursery rhyme that sounds suitably timeless is a challenge, but newcomer Weber's verse passes the test, and so do her haunting spreads, which carry whiffs of folk art and medieval books of hours. Ages 4-8. Agent: Hannah Mann, Writers House. (June)

The story begins as the horse gets out and then covers the impact of this on the other animals, both positively and negatively. Simple text and watercolors draw readers in to the event. When "the rabbit dug too deep and the beetle cried out in its sleep," a closer look reveals tiny details in the roots where the beetle dozes. This is true for most of the book; the larger picture is the escaped horse, but it invites inspection of a spider web and other delightful surprises. VERDICT A great addition to story hour collections, this book invites children to a wonderful time discovering cause and effect.—Elizabeth Willoughby, John P. Faber Sch., Dunellen, NJ