A WATER SNAKE'S YEAR
by Doris Gove & illustrated by Beverly Duncan
A title-spread cutaway illustration of the snake hibernating underground and a simple map locating her habitat in Tennessee's Great Smokies presage this fine book's careful regard for precision in every detail. Gove's lucid text covers a wealth of information—not just cycles of mating and giving birth, eating, shedding skin, and hibernating, but intriguing facts like how the snake emerges from water without leaving a telltale wet streak and the natural drama of her being swept downstream by a storm and then finding her way back to familiar territory. Duncan's lovely illustrations are as meticulous as the text, with each of the many plants shown in its appropriate season—violets and bluets when the snake emerges from hibernation in April, mountain laurel blooming at mating time in May. Relative size clues are also consistent and familiar (e.g., acorns). Each double-spread illustration gracefully accommodates a substantial amount of text in an ample space provided by an expanse of water, sky, or ground. An unusually felicitous blend of art, natural history, and thoughtful book design. Index. (Nonfiction. 7-11)*justify no*