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A Temporary Pet

A boy befriends a moose who only imperfectly follows his many rules.

Children tend to have distinct expectations of what owning a pet will mean—expectations often dashed, alas, by the unresponsive turtle, the indifferent cat or the retriever that refuses to fetch. Wilfred, the boy at the center of Oliver Jeffers's entertaining picture book "This Moose Belongs to Me" (Philomel, 32 pages, $16.99), is so specific in his requirements that he can enumerate dozens of rules governing the relationship between himself and the enormous moose he names Marcel. To the degree that Marcel obeys Wilfred's rules, he is an excellent pet: "He had no trouble with Rule 11, providing shelter from...

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