Leopold the Lion: Escapes from the Zoo

This highly illustrated book by Ann Marie Tomlins uses another of her children’s poems (her first was about Louie the Looney Loon Who Wanted to Fly to the Moon). This time the poem is about a Lion who decides he wants to leave his boring existance at the zoo to experience the excitement of life in the wild. He shortly discovers he is missed by all the children that used to visit him, and eventually he decides to return. Most of the simple poem lines are in large text on one page with full-page illustrations by Hailey McCarthy (who previously illustrated Donkey Oatie’s Irish Visitor for Tom Rath) on the facing pages.