As he did in Nana Upstairs and Nana Downstairs (Puffin, 1978) and The Art Lesson (Putnam, 1989), de Paola has used his own childhood memories to create a slice-of-family-life picture book. The simple, plain text tells of the close relationship between Tommy and his namesake grandfather, Tom. They read the comics together, act out poems and make up stories, and, in the final vignette, play practical jokes with discarded chicken parts (Tom is a butcher, by trade). The pictures are in the artist's familiar style, but they have more personality than some of his recent books in which the figures seem merely decorative. Tom and Tommy seem to be truly interacting rather than just posing in the same frame. There is a lively yet homey look to the characters and their surroundings. Although this book does not have the depth of feeling found in some of the author's previous titles, readers are given a fond glimpse of a grandfather who is a bit of a character and who, most importantly, loves his grandson. --Karen James, Louisville Free Public Library, KY Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.