McPhail’s worlds are so heartening and nourishing they might have just popped out of the kitchen stove. Big Brown Bear, as he’s known, is a generous and kind ursine presence, yet one who will take no hanky-panky from Rat. Rat has his beady eye on 3B’s slipper; it would make a comfy bed. Rat tries to abscond with the slipper, but 3B objects; he has 2 feet and needs 2 slippers. Then, for a touch of humor, McPhail dresses Rat as a door-to-door salesman offering free vacations, but no slippers allowed on the trip. No dice. Bears have a nose for scams. Later that day, after having filled Rat’s belly with oatmeal and cream, 3B discovers a box full of forgotten stuff on his closet floor. Sure as shootin’, there’s an old slipper, just what the rat ordered. Caring, sharing, a little cross-species harmony—McPhail wears them all so lightly, caught with unsubtle gestures and the muted use of Old World color. (Picture book. 3-7)
