New Releases by Wendy Pfeffer

The life cycle and physical characteristics of the polar bear.

Marta''s sister Rosa calls her magnet collection junk, but Marta''s magnets help her make friends in her new home and help her retrieve a lost key for Rosa''s new friend.

Wendy Pfeffer describes the amazing metamorphosis from tiny, jellylike egg, to little fishy tadpole, to great big bullfrog. Holly Keller has created the archetypal frog pond and we see it through the seasons as the tadpoles grow legs and lungs and eventually hop onto land: bullfrogs at last. "Well-designed ink drawings washed with soft-toned watercolors stretch across the double-page spreads, showing the action above and below water level. . . .an attractive, general introduction."—BL. 1994 "Pick of the Lists" (ABA) Best Children''s Science Books, 1994 (Science Books and Films)

Describes the Popcorn Park Zoo in New Jersey, which rescues and cares for animals that are sick, old, abused, or about to be destroyed.

The Change of Philomel is a study of the image of the nightingale in various genres of medieval literature. The major emphasis of the work is on French literature; there is a thorough treatment of the nightingale image in Provençal and Northern French lyrics and narrative works. Reference is made also to Middle English and Middle High German literary works. The nightingale proves to be a pervasive image, especially in the twelfth century. As a metaphor, the bird can represent the poet or the object of his affections; it can provide solace or competition for medieval poets; and the nightingale is also an inherently sexual symbol, a factor which is significant both for the use of the image and for its fall in popularity in the thirteenth century.