THE SLEEP SHEEP

McQuinn and Shaw breathe new life into an old saw—counting sheep—by matching an imaginative, wide-awake little girl with a large flock of peripatetic sheep far too busy to be counted. Ensuing ovine ambulation includes dancing, skating, cycling, scootering and swimming, followed by assorted gaming and crafting on the beach. When the sheep then understandably slumber, Sylvie can finally count them, which results in—well, you know. Shaw’s cheery mixed-media pictures depict skinny-legged, woolly sheep amid a plethora of accoutrements. Sylvie’s stuffed elephant is busy—and sleepy—when she is. Emergent readers can decipher, with help perhaps, signs, book titles and T-shirt messages as well as a trove of visual jokes. And even if they don’t understand the last laugh (as the sheep tiptoe off to a ship, an old ewe says, “Whew, I’m exhausted. / I thought she’d never nod off!”), they’ll think they did. A pleasant romp, wry and sweet. (Picture book. 3-6)