A small boy enjoys sitting near a rock, learning about the wildlife, deer, hawks, foxes, moss, lichens, and other living things that come in contact with the rock in the course of a day Grade 1-4-- A loving lesson in the cycles of nature and wildlife. The story of a rock and its denizens is told by a boy who senses its history. From a crevice he watches a deer approach and drink from a small pool, and he knows how Indians waited for the deer before his time. Calling the animals by their proper names--Fox, Coon, Hawk, Mouse, Moose, Beaver--he tells how each has found a home or a habitat in the rock. The boy senses that a fire burned the vegetation and forced the animals from their homes, and he can imagine the first new shoot sprouting years later--the first of a stand of paper birch trees embedded in the rock. Parnall's interest in woodland management is evident both in his carefully chosen words and in his illustrations. The spare use of line and color on stark white pages that results in his signature landscape hides many of the animals named in the text, and Indian as well. Yellow-ochre, small touches of green, blue-green, and red-orange highlight the simply rendered pencil sketches. Read aloud, the book will provide an excellent springboard for a discussion of ecology. --Susan Scheps, Shaker Heights Public Library, OH Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc. In the manner of Woodpile (1990), still another observation of a particular site, presumably on his Maine farm, by this much- honored illustrator. With his trademark bits of telling detail, spare, angular line, and muted color against dramaticly expansive white, Parnall records the changes--swift and slow, within, upon, and around--a large rock that plays host to various plants and creatures. A lovely tribute to nature's orderly, thrifty ways. (Picture book. 5-10) -- Copyright ©1991, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.