SOMETHING NASTY IN THE CABBAGES

A retelling of ``Chantecler and the Fox,'' not based on Chaucer but on a similar 12th-century French version of the tale about a vain cock who, caught by a trickster fox, escapes by tricking the fox in turn. The text here is well honed, pleasantly informal, and a bit more accessible than Cooney's (Caldecott Medal, 1959), but it's the illustrations that attract attention: lovingly rendered in exquisite, precisely observed detail, they depict dozens of tiny woodland creatures and a bucolic landscape, with just a few mischievous contemporary touches (e.g., a bike, and the buxom farmwife's bedroom slippers). The pictorial style is traditional, but the illustrations are full of life and humor, escaping their borders and providing dozens of entertaining details. A handsome debut for this English illustrator, and for the publisher. (Picture book. 4-10)*justify no*