An uninvolving tale about a friendship that survives the bad feelings engendered after Matthew breaks Tilly's purple crayon. A familiar story of a fight, loneliness, and eventual forgiveness is useful for its evocation of a multicultural inner city, but the impressionistic paintings are dark and exhibit a confusing lack of consistency and continuity.

Two best friends who quarrel over a broken purple crayon learn the value of forgiveness; This is not an unfamiliar tale,'' said PW,but it is told here with simple eloquence and poignancy.'' Ages 4-8. (Dec.)

PreS-Gr 1-- Matthew and Tilly, a pair of inner-city kids, are close friends. They play and work together every day. But even the best of friends occasionally get on one another's nerves, and when a crayon breaks, so does the relationship. However, all that is needed is a cool-down period and soon Matthew and Tilly are back in favor with each other. This modest story line swells with the visual excitement of Peck's paintings. The dreary streets of a decaying city are depicted in somber shades and broad brush strokes, brightened here and there by the light on crates of sidewalk vegetables, or the bright red of vending machines. The gloom of their estrangement is feelingly pictured as Matthew sits alone in a dark, barren stairwell. These pictures seem to owe something to the post-Impressionist work of Paul Cezanne, but are by no means merely imitative or derivative. Their power lingers in the mind long after they have been seen. --Ruth Semrau, Lovejoy School, Allen, TX