"IT IS THROUGH fantasy that children achieve catharsis," Maurice Sendak said when he accepted the Caldecott Medal for "Where the Wild Things Are" in 1964. "It is the best means they have for taming Wild Things." In four new picture books about imaginary friends, conjured companions of all kinds help children confront the beastly parts of life. In these books, the children's situations change when they meet real-life friends, but reassuringly, their chimerical pals never disappear. The Wild Things in Carter Goodrich's funny and endearing "We Forgot Brock!" are loneliness, parental detachment and silent adult disapproval. Goodrich, who has illustrated New Yorker covers, along with picture books including "Mister Bud Wears the Cone," has created a buoyant tale of friendship. Phillip, an ebullient red-haired boy, revels in the antics of his imaginary playmate, Brock, a pirate clad in polka-dot leggings who is a linchpin of fun. Goodrich renders Brock in black crayon, evoking a child-drawn paper doll. It's no wonder that Phillip has conjured Brock, since Phillip's soul-deadened parents seem to have wandered out of the 1950s. His father wears a tie while watching TV; his mother knits beside him, her coiffure immobile. Neither ever laughs in this bright watercolor world. They acknowledge Brock only grudgingly. When Brock is left behind at a fair, crisis ensues. "WE FORGOT BROCK!" Phillip wails. Back on the Ferris wheel, he's comforted by a little girl, Anne, and her own purple-crayoned mythical playmate. Children facing disapproval of their imaginary worlds will find companionship, and adult readers will long for a sequel in which Phillip's mother ditches the vacuum she wields on the final page and runs off with her own Brock. At the beginning of "Lenny & Lucy," by Philip C. Stead and Erin E. Stead, an over-loaded car chugs across the page, through a forest of tall trees: Peter's family is moving to a new home. "I think this is a terrible idea," Peter declares. "I want to go back." The warmth and large-heartedness on display in the Steads' Caldecott Medal-winning "A Sick Day for Amos McGee" suffuses every page, but with a darker sensibility. Erin Stead's mesmerizing illustrations subtly evoke the fear and pain of a young boy starting his life over. The "dark unfriendly" woods are black and white, while only Peter's sweater and shoes; his dog, Harold; his father's jacket; and various objects (the front door of their new house, a leaf) are colored. To keep the menacing forest at bay, Peter constructs "Lenny, Guardian of the Bridge" out of pillows and blankets; then he builds him a friend named Lucy. The two gentle guardians stand up for the first time when Peter's new neighbor, Millie, appears with binoculars, marshmallows and a stirring expression of trepidation and hope. "Lenny & Lucy" reminds us that it takes a small army of companions, real and imaginary, to face the dark unknown. The imaginary playmate takes canine form in Edward van de Vendel's "The Dog That Nino Didn't Have," translated from Dutch by Laura Watkinson. Anton Van Hertbruggen's beautiful, arresting illustrations depict Nino's loneliness with a striking intensity; his dusky palette of dark greens, rusty reds and mustard yellows, a landscape dotted with A-frame cabins and a wood-paneled station wagon impart a vintage feel. We learn one cause of Nino's melancholy when his traveling father appears in a pilot's uniform, agitated, clutching a phone, surrounded by flamingos. "The dog that he didn't have heard whatever Nino heard. On the phone. With Dad. Who was calling from a country far, far away," van de Vendel writes. On the next page, Nino is alone on his bed with his imaginary dog, who "liked tears. It loved the taste of salty water." One day, Nino's imaginary dog is replaced by a real dog. Yet something is still missing, until Nino realizes he can keep conjuring not only the imaginary dog but an array of animals. Though the translation occasionally sounds clunky ("This dog might not know so much about Dad and the phone") and the all-capitals type-face feels jarring, the book is a perceptive and moving exploration of childhood yearning. On the last page, Nino sleeps, guarded by his imaginary giraffe and bear, his real dog and - closest to him - the dog he did not have. In "Imaginary Fred," the illustrator Oliver Jeffers, whose picture books include the hilarious and exuberant "Stuck" and "The Day the Crayons Quit," teams with Eoin Colfer, author of the "Artemis Fowl" series, to tell a story from the imaginary friend's perspective. Fred is an ambitious imaginary boy: "He tried really hard to be the best imaginary friend he could be." Fred dreams of a companion who won't abandon him for a human counterpart, a situation that causes his dotted body to fade away. Then he meets Sam, his ideal human friend, he believes, until a real-life girl, Sammi, enters the picture. Fortunately, along with Sammi comes the imaginary, violin-playing Frieda. "We need to practice," Frieda demands. "Or we'll never get to Carnegie Hall." Eventually, Fred and Frieda seldom see their human friends, but their bodies never fade, which flummoxes "imaginary scientists" and makes Fred and Frieda "quite famous in the imaginary community." We learn that "a statue was commissioned to be erected in the sky above their imaginary house." Jeffers could illustrate a tax return and make it funny; his charming, willowy pen-and-ink artwork adds his trademark irreverence to this gentle tale about the ever-shifting landscape of friendship. These books celebrate children's vibrant and cathartic imaginary lives. And why should any fiction-reading adult disapprove (are you listening, Brock-ignoring parents of Phillip)? After all, books provide imaginary companions to readers of all ages, whether they're named Paddington, Hermione Granger, Elizabeth Bennet or Sherlock Holmes. These friends nourish and sustain us. They tame our Wild Things, and the imaginary scientists are right: They all deserve statues. MARGO RABB writes for both children and adults. Her most recent book is the young adult novel "Kissing in America."

An imaginary person has needs of his own. Fred, whose humanlike shape is made of digital blue patterning with no outline, floats "like a feather in the wind until a lonely little child wish[es] for him." If the conditions are "just right"a lightning strike, or maybe fish falling from the skyhe pops down to Earth and becomes that child's imaginary friend. It's always short-lived: as soon as the child finds "a real friend in the real world," Fred fades, whisked back to the sky until someone new needs him. Despite shabby treatmentthe real-world kids poke him with swords, make him vacuum, toss him hoopward as if he's a basketball, and undress him to laugh at his (not graphically depicted) nakednessFred longs for a friendship to be permanent. Humor arrives in Jeffers' quirky line drawings (the art is largely black and white). Fred and a friend struggle "to understand how the toilet work[s]"; a musical quartettwo real musicians, two imaginarybaffles the audience: "Why are there only two of them?" Common to many imaginary-friend stories, the ontology may confuse: Fred may be invisible, but he has thoughts and desires, so is he really imaginary? Readers who sometimes or even often enjoy playing by themselves may not appreciate the text's heavy-handed insistence that "being alone is no fun." Not the solidest piece in the looking-for-a-friend genre. (Picture book. 3-6) Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Gr 1-3-As an imaginary friend, Fred comes to Earth when lonely children wish for him, becoming whatever they need him to be, whether a companion to throw a ball with or someone willing to become the ball. When his friends outgrow him, finding real friends, Fred starts to disappear and his blue pixelated form vanishes until there is barely a scrap of him left, "just enough for the wind to catch and whisk him into the sky." Jeffers's clean, expressive black lines serve to contrast the corporeal world of Fred's friends and the world around them with Fred himself, who has substance but no outline. One day a boy named Sam wishes for Fred, and at last Fred finds someone who shares his interests and might just be a real friend. Eventually, though, Sam finds a real friend and, once again, Fred feels himself start to disappear-until, that is, he meets Sam's imaginary friend, Frieda. Together, Fred and Frieda form an imaginary friendship so real they never fade away. Tongue-in-cheek details in Jeffers's illustrations, such as a pig getting hit by lightning in order to summon Fred to Sam's side, juxtapose ironically with Colfer's simple text in a manner that will doubtless please child readers, especially those fond of the artist's other work. VERDICT An effervescent bit of fun.-Anna Stover, Poughkeepsie Day School, NY © Copyright 2015. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Fred, an imaginary friend, loves spending time with the lonely kids who wish for him--until each meets a "real friend" and poor Fred fades away. Then Fred meets Sam and begins an unusual friendship in which the rules change. Jeffers's delicate ink drawings and Colfer's lighthearted but sensitive tone are a perfect match in this quirky tale about friendship and growing up. (c) Copyright 2016. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Being lonely is no fun, and merely wishing for a friend won't solve the problem. Luckily for lonesome kids, Fred, composed of airy blue benday dots, is an exception to the rule. Unfortunately for Fred, however, when his human friends find real-life pals, he fades away. Fred is particularly excited when Sam summons him, since they are kindred spirits, but Fred knows the routine: Sam meets Sammi, and Fred's days are numbered. Only, Sammi has an imaginary friend, too Freida and the foursome become thick as thieves. Years go by and Fred doesn't fade away, but it's Freida who keeps his feet solidly on the ground. On crisp white pages with eye-catching pops of pigment imaginary friends, all in clouds of dots, are almost exclusively the only color Colfer and Jeffers tell a comforting tale about the power of friendship, imaginary or not. Jeffers' dynamic, minimalist black-ink line drawings are full of lively, whimsical detail, and though there's more text than the typical picture-book reader could manage independently, Colfer's restrained but engaging prose is ideal for one-on-one sharing. HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: Jeffers and Colfer are both big names on their own. Double the star power means double the demand.--Hunter, Sarah Copyright 2015 Booklist

In this smart collaboration, Colfer and Jeffers introduce Fred, a seasoned imaginary friend. Fred knows the drill: he keeps lonely children company until a human friend appears, then clears out ("Usually by lunchtime on the second day, Fred would be mostly invisible"). Jeffers's spidery vignettes are perfectly synced to Colfer's bubbly, confiding narrative, and he underscores Fred's evanescent nature by giving him a body of half-tone aqua dots that deepen and fade. Secretly, Fred pines for a forever friend; his current human assignee, Sam, shares all of his interests-reading, music, playacting. When Sam meets a girl named Sammi, Fred is downcast, especially when Sam leaves a note that says he and Sammi are working on a comic book. "Comic book? thought Fred. That was our idea. Me and Sam." But Sammi has her own imaginary friend, Frieda (her half-tone mesh is yellow), and the four thrive. There's always anguish when a close friend finds someone new, but Colfer and Jeffers show that shuffling allegiances can sometimes multiply the fun. Ages 4-8. Author's agent: Sophie Hicks, Sophie Hicks Agency. Illustrator's agent: Paul Moreton, Bell, Lomax, Moreton Agency. (Sept.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.