OVER AND UNDER THE PARK

Human visitors and wildlife residents both temporary and permanent experience activities and seasonal rhythms in a large urban park.

In settings modeled on New York’s Central Park, Neal depicts small figures in racially diverse groups strolling or wheeling over roadways and picnicking on broad lawns as leaves appear on trees, change color, and drop to signal passing seasons, birds and insects flit past, and pond-dwelling turtles sun themselves on rocks or rest beneath layers of ice. In simple, declarative sentences with lyrical touches that give the child’s-eye narrative a contrasting air of timelessness, Messner comments on all these activities: “Birds have returned with the warm winds of spring. Egrets and night herons glide toward the pond as a cellist plays from the shore.” The cellist is still there, playing beneath the full moon as light fades to dark in the final scene, and the two-legged visitors—riding bikes, trikes, and a wheelchair as well as on foot—flock homeward to “dream of a whole new season of wonder.” Closing notes add information about the animal cast and also recommended park websites, guides, and even poetry. It’s a fairly idealized depiction (there’s nary a rat or even pigeon to be seen), and though Messner doesn’t mention that Central Park is not a natural area but was thoroughly designed and engineered, on the whole, it’s an immersive, informative ramble.

An idyllic portrayal of a beloved park.