This is a Costa Rican rain forest version of an earlier Brett work called THE MITTEN, in which a variety of animals in a snowy wood scampered into a mitten. Carlos takes an umbrella made of banana leaves into a lush tropical milieu and drops it on the ground while he climbs a tree. One exotic creature after another finds it and jumps in, including a tapir, a toucan, a quetzal, and a kinkajou. A playful monkey flings the umbrella into the stream before jumping aboard. The merriment abruptly halts when a jaguar hops in, as all the other animals fervently hope that they won't be devoured. Author Jan Brett's spectacularly colorful and detailed paintings of the animals in the wondrous Monteverdi Cloud Forest accompany her text. Copyright (C) Muze Inc. 2005. For personal use only. All rights reserved.