The Dancing Clock

PreS-Gr 2—Milo, one of the snow monkeys at the Central Park Children's Zoo in New York City, loves watching the dancing animals and listening to the music on the Delacorte Clock, located at the entrance. He would so much like to join them that he ignores his friends. When the zookeeper forgets to lock their enclosure, Milo escapes and makes it to the top of the clock and has a happy time dancing with the bronze creatures. Eventually, though, he realizes that they are cold and can't hug him back, so he eagerly returns to his warm friends who love him. This story is told in verse that for the most part works, but some rhymes feel forced or are ungrammatical. The verse mentions trees but the monkey enclosure is shown with only a lone dead tree. The cartoon-style illustrations are colorful, picturing the park in autumn, and the children and adults are varied. Endpapers show an old-fashioned zoo with animals in small cages, but in the mid 1980s, the Central Park Zoo was remodeled and the cages were replaced with naturalistic environments. According to its website, the snow monkeys' environment even includes a hot tub. Children will need to look carefully at all the different pictures of the clock to find all seven dancing animals depicted. An additional purchase.—Elaine Lesh Morgan, formerly at Multnomah County Library, Portland, OR