Mrs. Harkness is a fascinating, intrepid character and Melissa Sweet's mixed media illustrations are breathtakingly gorgeous but the story left me disturbed. Mrs. Harkness snatches the baby panda from its habitat. Was it an orphan or taken away from its mother? And then in the timeline, its revealed the panda died after little more than a year in captivity. I understand it was different time and people thought differently about animal welfare but it leaves me troubled and I wonder if young readers will be, too.
