I LOVE YOU AS MUCH...

``Said the mother bear to her child,/`I love you as much as the forest has trees''': eight animals utter similar comparisons, sometimes involving food (the sheep loves the lamb ``as much as the grass''), which is logical; but at least one is curiously inapt—the camel loves ``her child...as much as the desert is dry.'' Sorensen provides sweeping double-spread paintings with appealing mother-child pairs, concluding with humans, but, overall, this is a slight effort. The author's The First Song Ever Sung (May 1993, received too late for review) also has a very simple text in which an idea is reiterated with so little variety that the repeated words begin to grate. Song, however, is far more successful—both because the concept is more original and because it rejoices in the splendidly creative illustrations of Ed Young. (Picture book. 2-5)