This is about poor EsmÉ who has no one to play with and finally gets a new baby sibling. But since it's by Chess, it's not one of those flat, simpy emotional fix-its. There's tang and humor in the early pictures of EsmÉ's otherwise-occupied parents and child neighbors, and more humor in the clouds that show her daydreams of companionship. Borrowing a book about wishing from the library, EsmÉ wishes for ""someone to play with her when she went to sleep"" (and pictures a bat on the bed post), ""someone to keep her company at grown-up parties"" (we see a plump rabbit nibbling finger food on the couch), and so on. ""But poor EsmÉ. Nothing happened."" Finally the desperate EsmÉ wishes on a star: ""Star! Do you hear me? I'll take anyone you send down any old time!"" And the next morning her parents make their announcement. Unexpected as it is, you might groan when EsmÉ's wish then comes true and she has ""someone special just for her""--but Chess maintains her wry integrity in the next and last frame, showing EsmÉ with a tub of diapers, a spilled bottle, and a hair-pulling baby: ""But she learned you have to be very sure that what you wish for is really what you want!"" Dispensable on pinched budgets, but fun.