JOSEFINA

Winter returns to the bordered acrylic vignettes that she mastered in Diego (by Jonah Winter, 1991) for another story inspired by the life of a Mexican artist. Josefina Aguilar carries on her family tradition of fashioning painted clay figures in the village of Ocotl†n. Josefina makes in the course of a day, one sun, two angels, three houses, etc., on up to ten stars before her day ends. The Spanish phrases number and name the objects as she creates them. The last spread shows all 55 of the clay figures, depicting Josefina's world with all its joys and sorrows. The palette of violet, teal, terra cotta, green, and rose is exceptionally lovely, and readers will enjoy searching for a blue parrot and a brown squirrel that appear in many of the pictures. A good follow-up to Pat Mora's Uno, Dos, Tres: One, Two, Three (p. 139), which also teaches the Spanish numbers, this is a useful lead-in to a discussion of the Mexican Day of the Dead celebration, since Josefina makes the calaveras, or dancing skeletons, that are symbols of that holiday. (Picture book. 4-8)