THE CRIMSON COMET

In another nighttime fantasy overflowing with visual extravagance, Morrissey sends two children to the Moon aboard a spaceship constructed from battered, photo-realistically depicted antique toys and bric-a-brac. When sleepless Nora sees the Moon suddenly go out, she rushes to tell her brother Jack, then joins him aboard his Crimson Comet—constructed around a wheeled old toy box that is transformed, as the two astronauts blast through the bedroom window, into a sinuously tailed assemblage of gleaming dials and gauges, drums, balloons, valves and brass fittings—to investigate. Discovering that the Moon, a massive mechanical airship piloted by a friendly old gent, has stalled out, Jack and Nora supply a jumpstart, then make a topsy-turvy return home, fueled by a bag full of harvested stars. The text, a sketchy mix of prose and rhyme, provides the perfect blend of wonder and matter-of-fact for this adventure-filled nocturnal flight. (Picture book. 6-8)