KIRKUS REVIEW
In Lennox’s debut, rhyming picture book, featuring illustrations by Aveira (Mariposa, 2019, etc.), a little boy searches for his lost shoe in the zoo and gets a surprise when he finds it.
“One day in the summer I went to the zoo, / And somehow or other I lost my right shoe!” narrates a young boy. He enlists the aid of zookeepers and they hunt for the footwear in habitats and enclosures, encountering a polar bear, a giraffe, camels, and many more creatures along the way. A helpful kangaroo checks her pouch; the boy even takes a snorkeling dip in the flamingo pond to look. Aveira’s semirealistic, full-color, full-page digital images feature lavish greenery, big-eyed, friendly animals, and relatable human characters (the boy and most other characters are white; a zookeeper and a few bystanders have brown skin). Children will have fun spotting what the boy doesn’t—including his upside-down shoe in the background. What the kindhearted boy discovers when he finally finds it is a sweetly comic revelation, and another surprise is still to come. The book is labeled “A Zoo Adventure for Ages 3 to 7,” which suggests that there may be a welcome series of adventures ahead.
A simple lesson in compassion, told in lively, rhyming text with engaging illustrations.