The World Is Your Oyster

Newcomer James strings together animal metaphors, one per page, while SanCartier supplies cheery watercolors. "Some days your world is raining cats and dogs," opens the book as readers get a worm's-eye-view shot of a boy holding an orange umbrella under a torrent of falling animals. The glum situations keep on coming: "You feel like you're up to your neck in alligators, and you're moving at a snail's pace." It sounds a little like the text of a greeting card, and ends with a suitably upbeat punchline: "If you grin and bear it... and reach for the stars, the world is your oyster!" Small children will have heard some of these expressions; others ("throw yourself to the lions"; "a little bird once told me") may puzzle them. And while the images themselves are lovely, SanCartier's watery paintings, which depict the expressions literally (a little boy picks up a bull by the horns) rather than elucidating their figurative meanings, won't provide much help. Less a children's story and more the sort of light entertainment that accompanies a dozen roses. Ages 4–8. (Mar.)