Woodland Christmas. Frances Tyrrell. Richmond Hill, ON: North Winds Press/Scholastic, 1995. 32pp, cloth, $16.99. ISBN 0-590-24430-2. Subject Headings: Folk songs, English-England-Texts. Christmas music. Preschool - grade 4 / Ages 4 - 9. Review by Diane Fitzgerald.

excerpt:

The animals in this book are:
one gray partridge,
two rock doves, three ruffled grouse,
four common loons, five river otters,
six Canada geese, seven whistling swans, eight raccoons,
nine red foxes, ten moose, eleven red squirrels
and twelve beavers.
The bird in the potted pear tree
is a California partridge,
and the courting couple are black bears.

Christmas books appear in number every year, and most fade away with the season. This one, Woodland Christmas, seems like nothing special in concept: the text is "The Twelve Days of Christmas"; the lovers of the song are anthropomorphized bears; and each day's gift is illustrated. But the animals (both those that are characters and those, like the singing birds, that are gifts) are indigenous to North American woodlands, and their costumes and habits (fur hats and tricorns; skating parties) recall 18th-century European settlements in the New World. And the illustrations also tell the story of an entire courtship and wedding over the twelve days.