Publisher's Weekly Review
Loggins's chart-topping 1984 single, cowritten with Dean Pitchford, returns with new lyrics to fit the zoo setting of this picture book adaptation, packaged with a CD recording. Instead of kicking off Sunday shoes, Loggins invites readers to "slip on their dancin' shoes" and join a rowdy cast of animals who show off several dancing styles. There's rock and roll-represented by apes in headbands and tie-dyed shirts ("Jeez, Louise, rockin' the chimpanzees")-llamas in tutus, tangoing tigers, and an elephant deejay spinning "funky, hop-hopping grooves" on a turntable. Bowers (Dinosaur Pet) maintains a high-energy atmosphere as the zoo comes alive by night, and his heavily brushed paintings create a sense of whirling, twirling movement on each page. Some of the trying-to-be-cool moments miss the mark-see the aforementioned deejay, as well as "Luke, too cute, funkiest cat at the zoo" in his backward cap, leather jacket, sunglasses, and gold chain-but the revised lyrics offer a fun way for parents and grandparents to "cut footloose" with a new generation. Ages 2-6. Illustrator's agent: Rubin Pfeffer, Rubin Pfeffer Content. (Oct.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Booklist Review
In many ways, Loggins' 1985 Grammy-winning hit, Footloose, is a natural fit for kids. Irrepressibly bouncy with slingshotting verses and a shout-worthy chorus, it's just the sort of thing that gets kindergartners leaping up and lurching (sorry, dancing) around. So this rewritten, 31-years-later picture-book adaptation makes sense. Forget the moral-religious connotations of the movie; here, night is falling on a city zoo, which means it's time to cut loose, put on your dancin' shoes, and all that. Monkeys don fringed vests, wolves get top-hatted, llamas turn out in tutus, the elephant gets DJ bling, and so forth. Loggins' constant usage of names (Ooh whee, / Lucy, / shake it, shake it for me) requires clumsily labeling characters, but otherwise Bowers' colorful, canted, chirpy illustrations are appropriately busy and undulating. Young readers likely won't mind the total lack of story, but they may find the text puzzling. The repeated phrase, lose your blues, never seems to match the cadence. Until, of course, kids memorize the included CD. Which they will. So get ready.--Kraus, Daniel Copyright 2016 Booklist
