The Bureau of Misplaced Dads

First published in France, Veillé’s fantasy opens with a great hook, as a boy with round-rimmed glasses and a puzzled expression says, “I accidentally misplaced my dad this morning.” Luckily, when he sets out to hunt for him, he immediately meets a man in an overcoat who “just so happens” to work at the Bureau of Misplaced Dads. “At least 20 or 30 dads wander in every day,” he tells the boy matter-of-factly. “They’re usually in fairly good condition.” He guides the boy through the facilities, where waiting fathers include animal-skin-wearing cavemen (they’ve been waiting “since the dawn of time”), ballet-dancing dads, and dads in bathrobes with bad hair. Martin’s (Daydreams of a Solitary Hamster) clean, calm drawings confer tidy factuality on the man’s discussion of fathers as a population to be managed, like giraffes or antelope (“Once a year, we release a few dads back into the wild. Just for fun”), and the ending restores the boy’s dad to him in a way that comports gracefully with the whole. Future Wes Anderson fans will enjoy this understated romp. Ages 4–7. (Aug.)