THE ICE JOURNEY

In a retelling of an Icelandic tale resembling ``Hansel and Gretel,'' a king's children (Sigurd and Ingibjorg) are secretly armed with gifts from their dead mother—a belt that keeps the wearer from hunger, a dagger that cuts through stone—when their wicked stepmother Godrun sets them adrift in a trunk. They land on an island inhabited by Godrun's sister, a blind witch who cages and tries to fatten them to eat; escaping, they trick the witch into falling off a cliff to her doom. Fortuitously, their father turns up to sail them home, where Godrun and her brother are revealed as trolls and turned to stone by the rising sun. With settings of northern seascapes and rocky crags, biomorphic roots, and medieval artifacts, Darke's watercolor illustrations are suitably wild and romanticized; her humans are a bit clumsy, but her witches and trolls are imaginatively rendered and satisfyingly warty. Lively with incident, this provides an interesting contrast to more familiar tales. The title seems to have nothing to do with the story as told here; no source given. (Folklore/Picture book. 7-10)