In Window Eight, the Moon is Late

In this partially rhymed narrative, Ann moves through a summer day from afternoon to evening to bedtime. Sent on an errand to the basement, she looks at the casement window and finds that ``weeds grow in the sun in window one.'' This way of viewing the world, through windows, continues in other scenes of family life and bedtime preparation, until Ann sees out her window, number eight, that the moon is late. Her eyes are two more windows, which she closes, and the last window is that of the imagination, opening into dream time. The verse is alternately lilting and lurching, and introduces the window theme belatedly. But Allison's pastel-colored pictures capture the balmy good spirts of a summer evening and its leisurely winding down. Ages 3-8. (Dec.)