Pomelo, a small, posy-pink elephant, musters courage and embarks on a grand adventureone with all the harrowing challenges and unexpected rewards of any good trip.Readers already friendly with Pomelo (Pomelo's Opposites, 2013, etc.) know he's maturing and learning all the time, but a solo journey outside his garden home? Could he be ready? After packing an odd assortment of necessities, including his "knife-fork," a head of garlic, an old photograph, pumpkin seeds, some ribbon, a world map, and a few strawberries and acorns, he throws a stone to determine his course and takes off (after a quick wee). Pomelo's quirks endear from the get-go, and he must rely on all his wide-eyed good humor and earnestness for the rocky road ahead. Lively matte artwork depicts delightful mushrooms, flower buds and cactusas well as oppressive storms, frightening waves and dark nights. "Inside Pomelo feels jiggly, like a heap of pudding on a plate. He wants that feeling to go away. What can he do to stop it?" Amid the cheery storytelling and dear illustrations, the very straightforward scariness surrounding solitude and self-reliance surfaces, along with some coping strategies. Pomelo uses a star to guide him through tough times and finally into the pointy arms of a starfish soul mate.This jaunty little elephant provides a mammoth lesson for young readers about bravery, grit and fortitude. (Picture book. 4-6) Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

"SOMEONE GOES ON A JOURNEY" ÍS One of the guiding precepts of narrative; "Are we there yet?" is one of the guiding precepts of childhood. Picture books must inhabit the middle of this Venn diagram, offering stories as scenic and driving as any novel, at a pace more novel than driving through scenery. Four new package deals have come across my desk; let's see what we can book. Anthony Browne, over the course of a long and impressive career, has embarked on voyages ranging from the Joycean interiors of "Voices in the Park" to his adaptation of "King Kong," which is the sort of book you need to keep in a separate room from the one in which you're sleeping. His new picture book, "What If ... ?," is an anxious effort, too. Young Joe worries on his way to a birthday party, and as he shares his fears with his mother - "It's nice to meet new people"; "Not if they're HORRIBLE!" - they peek through the windows of all the homes on the block, revealing various unnerving tableaus in Browne's trademark sharp detail, some in homage to such party killers as Bruegel and Tenniel. The party turns out O.K., but the touch of shadow one always finds in Browne's work - not to mention the book's discomfiting title - tells us that this is nothing but luck. The endpapers display a vast array of stars - a world of possibility where the chances of a lovely time, particularly in the British suburbs, are no greater than those of being attacked by wild beasts. The young heroes of Aaron Becker's "Quest" don't seem nervous at all - admirable, or perhaps foolhardy, given the scope of their adventure. "Quest" is the sequel to Becker's Caldecott Honor book, "Journey," another wordless picture book with an enormous following. One hates to rain on parades. "Journey" begins with a bored girl drawing a door with a glowing red pen - or perhaps a wand - that then opens and leads her to a world of wonder. By the start of "Quest" she has been joined by a friend with another enchanted, um, crayon. I'm not the first critic to comment on Becker's debt to "Harold and the Purple Crayon," but while Crockett Johnson invested his device with a deadpan anarchy - first Harold draws too many pies, then a moose and porcupine to finish them - the crayons of "Quest" provide quick-fix solutions. Locked doors? The children draw keys. Need to swim? Scuba gear. Similarly, the vast landscapes, though ably detailed in vibrant watercolors, are just what you would think of when you think of things like this. The king has a long white beard, the underwater city looks like every Atlantis; it would be nice if Becker and his heroes were dreaming up something beyond basic genre. There's nothing wrong with a familiar adventure, but here's hoping that the third book in the Journey trilogy - even money it's titled "Voyage" - takes us into more startling territory. The territory is startling from the moment you open "Pomelo's Big Adventure," the fourth book in the Pomelo the Garden Elephant series - the endpapers show a landscape of striped rocks and other not-quite-discernible items from the world of Ramona Badescu (loopy words) and Benjamin Chaud (loopier pictures). Pomelo the elephant decides to set out on an adventure "now that his dandelion is bare." If we understand these books as ways to help children get a grip on the world, this sort of off-kilter beginning has precisely the bewildering texture of real life, in which a picture book reader might find herself strapped into a plastic seat right after breakfast, the better to be punctual for circle time. Philip C. Stead, most famous for writing the deserved classic "A Sick Day for Amos McGee," starts his new book, "Sebastian and the Balloon," in the same slanted way: "Sebastian sat high on his roof - something he was never supposed to do. 'There is nothing to see on my street,' he thought. ... 'Tonight I'll leave and see something new for a change.'" On a roof, near a bare dandelion : We're already someplace interesting before we leave, and both books tug us into dynamic worlds as harum-scarum as they are utterly believable. Pomelo and Sebastian do their packing - the elephant takes, among other things, "his toothbrush, his knife-fork, his pillow, an old photograph, some ribbon, pumpkin seeds, a world map" and other items that we do and do not spot in the brilliantly scattered illustration, while Sebastian gathers "all the things he would ever need," letting us catalog his holdings ourselves. In both books, some of the items come in handy and some never appear again; to summarize either journey is to insult the dashing and daring these wonderful stories accomplish. As with Sendak or Murakami, one has the sense that literally anything can happen, without the work feeling reckless or ungrounded; also like Sendak and Murakami, the two books really have hardly anything in common. "Pomelo's Big Adventure" feels like a story one improvises for a child, adding more details and twists as the mood strikes. "Sebastian and the Balloon," on the other hand, feels like a story one hears from a child, intriguingly full of missing information. Pomelo gets conned by an unnamed animal - Chaud makes him look like a rat - and ends up with a friend; Sebastian gathers friends as he goes, and ends up somewhere the thoughtfully minimal text, and Stead's multitextured illustrations, cannot describe. "They rode... and rode," the book concludes, Sebastian and the others having reached (and repaired) a roller coaster, "until the wind picked up and it was time to go," this last page giving us nothing but a grainy blue sky and a single bird - it's a goose-pimply moment. Pomelo, on the other hand, can be found everywhere - an early spread describes his route as "prickly, uphill, sticky, boring, surprising, lively and ... lost in the distance." But far from lost, there are 11 Pomelos across Chaud's every-which-way depiction, easily one of my favorite illustrations of the year. "Pomelo's Big Adventure" and "Sebastian and the Balloon" show that every step of the way, from packing to snacking, is part and parcel of an exciting journey; like all terrific books, they're reasons enough to travel. DANIEL HANDLER'S latest book as Lemony Snicket, "Shouldn't You Be in School?," has just been published.

Pomelo the elephant's fourth outing is perhaps the most traditional of any of his books, but, rest assured, it's every bit as eccentric as its predecessors. Ready to see new places, Pomelo packs a knapsack and sets forth, eventually trading in for a windup car and meeting a large elephant he dubs Papamelo and a strange starfish-like creature. Badescu conveys the nervousness and anxiety that can come with traveling solo, and tiny, pink Pomelo remains a quirky, comic hero. Some of the more cerebral and adult observations, though ("We take many risks in life, of course, but Pomelo seems to have plunged into a world ruled by chance"), may zoom past young readers. Ages 4-8. (June) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

This time, Bădescu's guileless miniature pink elephant takes a directionless solo journey through a jungle, across a desert, and so on. The book's concerns--finding one's way, going it alone--might not speak to young readers, but they will nevertheless enjoy the illustrations rich in detail and spiked with humor. A recent college graduate might be this book's perfect reader. (c) Copyright 2014. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

K-Gr 3-Badescu's pink pachyderm sets off on an adventure after his dandelion becomes bare. He packs his bag with both useful and silly things and tosses a rock with an attached ribbon to decide his direction. He treks through the desert, gets swindled by a con artist, and shares a sausage with his father in the forest. Pomelo then builds a boat and sails until he reaches land. There he makes friends with a starfish. The story has a type of absurdist surrealism that requires reading between the lines, and it might be completely lost on children. Originally written in French, it seems there is something lost in translation. Children will be quick to zero in on the fact that elephants don't have "paws" and that the illustrated sky is white while the text says it's "blue through and through." However, the artwork is enchanting and eccentric, mimicking the story line. For libraries in which Pomelo is popular, a purchase is recommended. For children not familiar with the little elephant's idiosyncratic tales, it may be best to pass.-Emily E. Lazio, The Smithtown Special Library District, NY (c) Copyright 2014. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.