Flight of Fancy: The Almost Impossible Thing by Basak Agaoglu

A day when rabbits fly?

It seems an incredible, impossible vision, but a little long-eared rabbit watches a bird fly across the sky, and she has a sudden yen....

ONCE UPON A TIME THERE WAS A DREAM.

She flaps her impressively long ears, but there's no lift off.

It's time to go back to the old drawing board, and Rabbit does, chalking up designs and computations, until she has some promising possibilities.

Maybe she can get a lot of lift from bouncing high on a trampoline.

No. It's right back down to earth. She constructs some feathery wings.

How about soaring on her skiis off the ski jump? She's airborne, wings outspread, but not for long, as her parabola lands her deep in a snowbank.

That was fun while it lasted, but she needs a little help. How about a kite? It has lift, lots of it--until it lands in The inevitable tree.

But the impossible dream remains. Perhaps if she could enlist enough rabbits with flapping ears and a dream like hers....

LOTS OF RABBITS!

Where there's a will, there's a way, in Basak Aguoglu's The Almost Impossible Thing (Philomel Books, 2017), in which our rabbity protagonist rockets off into the wild blue yonder. It's definitely a flight of fancy, in an imaginative picture book that offers dreamy illustrations, little rocket science, and some crowd sourcing, along with a chance for young readers to spread their wings and follow the dream. Agaoglu's illustrations combine simple but stylized line drawings of sky-struck rabbits surrounded by a flowing colors and minimalist scenery, the stuff that dreams are made of. "A rewarding debut..." says Kirkus Review.

Mom On the Case: The Runaway Bunny (75th Anniversary Edition) by Margaret Wise Brown

ONCE THERE WAS A LITTLE BUNNY WHO WANTED TO RUN AWAY.

"IF YOU RUN AWAY," SAID HIS MOTHER, "I AM RUNNING AWAY.

FOR I AM YOUR MOTHER.

Bunny is feeling a bit adventurous--and perhaps a bit argumentative.

"I WILL BECOME A FISH," COUNTERS BUNNY.

Mother Bunny responds that she will become a fisherman and catch him in her net. Unabashed, Bunny continues, saying he will become a sailboat on the sea, and Mother Bunny's comeback is that she will become the wind. Now who's in charge here?

Bunny challenges, saying that he will run away to become a rock on the high mountain, and Mother Bunny says she will be a mountain climber.

That's a hard one to top, but Bunny tries, stating that HE will be a trapeze artist in the circus, but Mother takes it to a higher level, claiming she'll be the tightrope walker on the high wire.

Well! What if Bunny becomes a boy who runs into the house? Mother Bunny happily reports that she'll be there to give him a hug!

"SHUCKS!" SAYS BUNNY. "I MIGHT AS WELL STAY AND BE YOUR LITTLE BUNNY!"

Second only to Beatrix Potter's The Tale of Peter Rabbit, Margaret Wise Brown's The Runaway Bunny: A 75th Anniversary Retrospective (Harper, 2017) was among the first to use the character of "the little runaway," which became an oft-used picture book premise that has flourished ever since. It is fitting that this classic get a brand-new edition to delight new generations of youngsters who will respond to the calm voice and dedication of Mother Rabbit to her little rebel, and Brown's gentle illustrations are just as humorous and sweet as ever. A fine book for Easter or Mothers Day or anytime.