Friends who seem to be opposites find common ground.Lightning-quick, impulsive Jasper, a fox, and his gentle, deliberately paced pal, Ollie, a sloth, head to the pool—or, rather, overbearing Jasper prevails on him to go. Jasper races ahead, oblivious that Ollie hasn't yet left the house. When Jasper arrives and fails to see Ollie, the fox is convinced Ollie's already there and sets out on a breakneck, madcap search to find him. In the end, the friends catch up with each other and make new plans. The story is thin and unoriginal, and some youngsters may wonder why, given that these guys are besties, Jasper is unaware of their speed differences and that Ollie couldn't have gotten to the pool first. However, the quirky, comically energetic illustrations are the real draw and should elicit giggles. At the outset, a spread divided into three horizontal strips that include dashed lines traces Jasper's frenzied scramble to win the race-that-never-was. Numerous subsequent spreads set at the pool are split horizontally so that the larger, upper portions depict Jasper's frantic pursuit, while contrasting, comic-strip-like lower segments show Ollie leisurely ambling toward the pool, making stops on the way. Visual and tactile learners will savor the dashed lines incorporated into those illustrations of Jasper, too, enabling them to trace his breathlessly overwrought search as he recklessly wreaks havoc everywhere.Good friends neatly show that differences don't matter. (Picture book. 3-7)

PreS-Gr 1 Jasper the fox and Ollie the sloth are having breakfast when Jasper asks his friend if he wants to go to the pool. Not waiting for the sloth's answer, he challenges Ollie to race him there and flies out the door, pulling on his trunks outside. Not surprisingly, Jasper arrives first and becomes exasperated waiting for Ollie to arrive, convinced that he must have snuck in unnoticed. While Ollie takes his time, a frenetic Jasper turns the place upside down looking for his friend and gets tossed out by the hippo lifeguard for pulling an alarm. When Ollie finally arrives, Jasper suggests that they go to the beach together instead. Willan's colorful cartoonish illustrations borrow some comic book elements, mixing full page spreads with split frames that depict the friends' contrasting journey towards the pool, multiple perspective shifts, using a dotted red line to trace the fox's path, and speech balloons as the story's only narration mechanism. The blocky stylized animals are highly expressive, from the fox's frenzied impatience, the annoyance of the animals at the pool and the delighted dillydallying of the lackadaisical sloth. VERDICT A hilarious and lively romp that sneaks in a message about the importance of patience and will have its readers hoping for some follow-up adventures of the "odd couple" friends. Yelena Voysey, formerly at Pickering Educational Library, Boston University