Sydney & Taylor Explore the Whole Wide World
(Sydney & Taylor)

This genial series opener by Davies (Panda Pants) introduces two friends who inhabit a cozy burrow under a potting shed: Taylor, a hedgehog with big ideas, and Sydney, a contented skunk. When Taylor gets a notion to see the Whole Wide World, contrary to the animals' homebody natures, the friends set off, encountering challenges en route. These include their own poor map-reading skills, a ferocious dog, and frogs--dressed in old-fashioned bathing suits and straw boaters--who refuse to be hunted (" 'Hunt what?' asked another frog. 'Well... you, ' said Taylor, who was a very honest hedgehog"). Gouache and colored-pencil illustrations by Hocking (the Max Explains Everything series) render the companions as sweetly expressive creatures who share their richly imagined environment with snails and insects. Although the friends' dynamic is fairly one-sided, with Sydney alternately encouraging and pushing the anxious Taylor to follow through with the desired expedition, Taylor's perseverance (and readers') is rewarded with the satisfaction of a completed journey, a return to home's comforts, and the suggestion that a story of adventure might be a treasure equaling the adventure itself. Ages 6-9. (Feb.)