Sadie the Air Mail Pilot

Meticulous illustrations and a daredevil tiger for a heroine make this aviation story stand out. Sadie, an unflappable pilot with orange eyes, welcomes dangerous missions. She takes inspiration from never-say-die rhymes like “No wind, no rain, no cold or flu,/ Can stop the Air Mail getting through!” Air Mail HQ operates from a multicolored, vertigo-inducing skyscraper built with rooftop runways for its fleet of shiny antique planes. Its autumn-red interior resembles the girdered structure of the Golden Gate Bridge, and the rich palette of deep red, forest green, honey gold and gravy brown emphasizes the book’s 1930s aesthetic. The air-mail Chief, a tough-talking elephant, gestures at a map of South America; he sends other aviators—including an ostrich, anteater and bear—off to Lima, Santiago and Córdoba. Despite an unenviable delivery route to Knuckle Peak Weather Station, Sadie gamely shrugs on her jacket and yells, “Chocks away!” She pilots her single-seat, fire-engine-red plane “over coffee farms and banana trees.” Rocky cliffs rise all around, macaws fly nearby and a river meanders through a tropical jungle far below. By contrast, icy Knuckle Peak lives up to its name, yet Sadie’s luck and perseverance win the day. Strøm’s hyperbolic paintings are equal parts Rio, Hong Kong and Fritz Lang’s Metropolis ; his feline Sadie has the brashness of Katharine Hepburn and Amelia Earhart. Readers will be hard put to glance away from the intensively detailed, panoramic views and Sadie’s feats of derring-do. Ages 5-8. (Sept.)