A boy investigates the disappearance of a fish in this debut picture book.
Jamie, a freckle-faced child with a poof of curly brown hair, is dismayed to get home from school and discover that Fritz is missing from his fishbowl. Jamie’s first step in locating the beloved Fritz is putting up lost-pet posters, a move sure to start preschool readers giggling. When a helpful local gumshoe—decked out in a Holmes-ian hat and trench coat and bizarrely walking a sweater-wearing squirrel on a leash—calls Jamie’s problem a mystery, the boy approaches Fritz’s vanishing like a detective. Clues lead to a feline suspect, but other hints send Jamie all the way to a water treatment facility. Although he fails to find Fritz, the fish shows up in the most unexpected place for a happy ending. Ball’s text and Özcan’s (Köse Bucak Safranbolu, 2016, etc.) illustrations work in perfect sync to expand the story in a way neither could accomplish alone. The cartoonish images include plenty of silly and absurd details sure to delight young readers, who may spot a missing bird and frog featured on posters. (Jamie’s race is unclear in the pictures.) Ball’s first-person, tongue-in-cheek narration is accessible despite several challenging words and phrases (“alibied,” “key witness”). And Jamie’s efforts are worthy of the big win at the tale’s conclusion.
A clever introduction to sleuthing for young readers, with plenty of context in the illustrations to offset some unfamiliar vocabulary.
--- Kirkus Reviews