Liz Rosenberg reviews four new picture books for today's The Boston Globe.

Rosenberg is happy to see a crop of new picture books for the youngest readers, as "most of last year's best books were for older readers." She reviews three for the toddler set and one for kids ages 13 and up (Little Green: Growing Up During the Chinese Cultural Revolution).

• This Little Chick, by John Lawrence ("animals cavort, skip, dance over hills, and comport themselves in a most delightfully undignified manner")
• Goodnight Lulu, by Paulette Bogan ("a manically wonderful comic romp of a book")
• Fancy Nancy, by Jane O'Connor, illustrations by Robin Preiss Glasser ("great comic touches throughout, and the foreshadowing of the plot's central slapstick moment is perfectly rendered")
• Little Green: Growing Up During the Chinese Cultural Revolution, by Chun Yu ("She captures the sense of wonder, delight, occasional terror, and sadness that marked her growing-up years. The natural world is ever-present....bursting with life, and no library in America should be without it.")

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Okay, I'm off to do some reading. I've managed to get myself into a difficult situation--I'm part or most of the way through some ten children's novels. I want to review them, but I'm in a reading limbo caused by overambition.

There should be a name for this phenomenon. I know it happens to every reader at least a couple times a year.