A nonsensical rhyming tale of an unusual Christmas adventure shows the persistence of a heartbroken little girl trying to rescue Redbird. Kate's mother, in a Marge Simpsonlike beehive, complains about the enormous pine growing higher than any tree among the rows of identical houses where she and her daughter live. She cruelly orders it cut down even though a bird may live there: ``About such creatures I don't give a pittance. That tree is going and I say good riddance!'' The lone bird nesting there and Kate are ``sadder than sad'' when the tree is moved to Rockefeller Center to serve as the Christmas tree at the skating rink. There the tree is decorated with hundreds of stuffed red birds, which come to life in a sort of Christmas miracle and carry the tree back to its former home (readers will have to assume that the saw cut that severed it from its roots will heal). Kate's mother finally admits that the tree must ``belong in our yard.'' A mediocre text comprised of tortured meter makes this no easier on readers than the forced plot, but the illustrations are full of humor in the exaggerated lines of cartoons, and in the homely details: hair curlers, puffy slippers, and Kate's omnipresent hair bow. (Picture book. 4-8)
