Nancy Hundal and Brian Deines, the team behind Prairie Summer, tell the story of a hot afternoon in which a family enjoys the newest addition to the father’s truck fleet in an unusual way. While the oldest girl (the narrator) and her younger brother and sister excitedly explore inside the dump truck’s cab, their father, wielding the garden hose, transforms the tip into an impromptu pool.

In a few deft strokes, Hundal creates the illusion of family life, revelling in its droll moments. For instance, she suggests the mother’s annoyance and the father’s dismay when, dumping the water, he washes away the gravel drive: “Mom is suddenly standing behind us, looking at dad…His mouth is like an O.” Hundal has an absolute grip on childhood experience, from the delight in chocolate found in the glove compartment, to the sentimentality about the discarded truck, to the nonchalance about the bone-chilling water: “It gives my feet a headache, but that doesn’t matter.”

Throughout, the narrator’s voice is completely authentic, and even lyrical, as when she describes the children’s need “to scream a lot, to let out the cold.” Brian Deines’s gorgeous illustrations are impressionistic, rendered in a glowing, intense summer palette. He achieves a tremendous variety of composition despite the simplicity of the story – three children playing in a truck. The gestures and postures of the characters are vividly expressive, humorous, and always true-to-life. The sophisticated artwork will probably appeal more to parents than to children, but both the pictures and story of this family’s ingenuity and capacity for joy are sure to be remembered fondly as young readers grow up.