The Mermaid’s Shoes

Just before the end of her seaside holiday, Mia finds a pair of swimming flippers: “Mermaid’s shoes!” she thinks. On the opposite page, te Loo paints Mia leaning glumly in the doorway of her city apartment, still wearing the flippers; she misses the ocean. With appealing enterprise, Mia makes a tail out of an old dress and sets off in search of a place where a mermaid can play. The large trim size allows te Loo plenty of space to celebrate the places Mia rejects: the zoo’s aquarium, with its resident shark; the city’s river, which looks “very deep”; and the natural history museum’s ghostly whale skeletons. The right spot turns out to be a public fountain. “And that’s how it began,” the next page reads, as a cell phone held by an unknown hand snaps a photo of mermaid Mia. The last pages feature painted “photos” of other mermaid children from around the world. Mia’s inventiveness is admirable, but te Loo’s sparkling, ambitious spreads seem to be reaching for something of more consequence than this relatively lightweight story. Ages 4–up. (Apr.)