Girls and Boys Come Out to Play

Mother Goose, wings outstretched, alights on the roof of a house with a binary invitation for a neighborhood’s children: “Girls and boys come out to play.” Still clutching stuffed animals, they tumble forth in twos and threes under the full moon, looking a little like stuffed animals themselves in pajamas and slippers, their dogs lolloping alongside them. Soon they meet Humpty Dumpty, Old King Cole, and a host of other nursery rhyme celebrities. Plans to make a delicious dessert unfold (“You find the milk... and I’ll find the flour”) when Mother Goose realizes that “a halfpenny roll will serve us all” may be over-optimistic; the pudding mixture for the crowd requires the famous “rub-a-dub” tub. Quiet cheer and sweet-tempered humor mark artwork by Pearson (Tuck-in Time), who sprinkles her loosely drawn pen, ink, and watercolor spreads with incidents for readers to discover (a child who’s a bit older than the rest sports pigtails with a life of their own; a cat laps spilled milk; a shaggy dog makes off with the halfpenny roll). And at last, post-pudding sleepiness overtakes the crowd in a nursery rhyme fantasy that offers both excitement and coziness. Ages 4–6. (Mar.)

Correction: A previous version of this review misstated the book's publisher.