My daughter barrowed this book from her classroom. I started to read this with the kids every night, but this one was way to boring to finish. We read a pretty good chunk of it, and just could not get into it. The little boy in the story waits at the zoo all day for single parent families and once he finds one he uses the kid to make himself a part of the family for the day. Since we didn't finish this I can't really say what the message in the story was, but at the beginning it was basically how to be a child mooch.
I first read this book when I was 9 years old and have reread it multiple times. It is the story of a boy who has to deal with a lot of loss in his life and how he is able to find people to become like a family meeting his own needs for close ties as well as helping out those he meets as well.