Don't count your chicks

Based on a Scandinavian folktale, this lesser-known d'Aulaires' picture book, first published in 1943, recalls Aesop's fable "The Milkmaid and Her Pail." An old woman walks into town to sell a basketful of eggs laid by her one reliable hen. Along the way, she speculates how she might turn the profits into, first, a few more hens, then a whole hen house full, and so on until she has become a wealthy lady who turns her nose up at everything -- and as she turns her own nose up while she imagines, the basket of eggs on her head crashes to the ground. She laments her lost future for a moment but then heads home grateful for all she has already. Not unusually for its time, the book's pages alternate between full-color art (in what looks like pastels) and black-and-white (in pencil). Both hold viewers' attention with their homey details, appealing farm animals, and apple-cheeked, upbeat protagonist. Martha V. ParravanoSeptember/October 2023 p.106 (c) Copyright The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.