Author: Stuart Gibbs
Illustrator: Lucy Ruth Cummins (map illustration: Ryan Thompson)
© Date: 2010
Publisher: Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers
Pages: 294
Chapters: Yes
Illustrations: No
Publisher Recommended Age: 8-12 years
Bonus Activities at End of Book: No
Summary from Book: Teddy Fitzroy has a murder on his hands and trouble on his tail.
Henry the Hippo, the beloved mascot of FunJungle, America’s newest theme park, has gone belly-up. The park claims he died of natural causes, but Teddy suspects foul play. When the police refuse to take him seriously, Teddy sets out to find the truth—and gets far more than he bargained for. It turns out Henry was two tons of trouble—and a lot of people wanted him dead.
So who did the dirty deed? Was it Martin del Gato, FunJungle’s head of operations, who hates kids and hates animals even more? Or Pete Thwacker, the exasperated head of PR, who’s cleaned up Henry’s messes one time too many? The list goes on and on. . . and soon Teddy finds himself in jeopardy too. He’d better find the killer behind the hippo homicide fast. . . or Henry won’t be the only one who’s dead.
Page Pig Thoughts: I discovered that I enjoyed this one more than I realized. The morning after I finished reading it, I found myself missing reading it. I thoroughly enjoyed all of the animal facts and zoo operation tidbits that were sprinkled throughout this fast-paced who-done-it mystery. This one gets you thinking about the culprit, but also the role that zoos have in society and for animal conservation. Mentions of unkind things that people do to animals and each other at the zoo are made, but they mostly add to the story and don’t feel preachy.
I hope to read it with Page Pup soon, but until then, I am likely to start the second book in the series sooner, rather than later.
Use caution with younger or sensitive readers, animals are killed, autopsies are observed, dead animal carcasses get smelly.
Family Unit: Teddy (12yo) lives with his mother and father in a trailer on the edge of FunJungle’s property.
Conflict/Social Issues:
- Teddy is a child, and mischievous at that, so he is not always taken seriously.
Positive Items:
- Teddy correctly assesses that adults were not tending to a situation that needed tending, then he is successful at putting together the clues. Teddy’s parents try to protect him and help him when they can.
- The story shines a light on the hard work that animal researchers and vets put in to give species the best chance of survival.
Items of Interest:
- Teddy gives water balloons to the chimps. Then when people throw stuff at the chimps (people can be like that), chimps can throw water balloons back, not poop. FunJungle security sees it more as supplying animals with weapons and unwanted behavior.
- Potty humor is kinda present. Henry the hippo poops all over because he’s a hippo. But because he is an ornery hippo, he likes to fling his poop at tourists.
- Teddy’s mother is a well regarded gorilla researcher. His father is a well regarded animal photographer. Due to his parent’s status, they live in the FunJungle housing at the edge of the property along with some other animal researchers. He spends his days wandering the FunJungle property and trying to stay entertained.
- Teddy grew up in the Congo while his mother was researching gorillas. He spent his time learning about wildlife and out in nature. When civil war broke out, Teddy’s parents decided that life would be safer elsewhere. Teddy has been on photo shoot trips with his father, who finds time for adventure when he can.
- After Henry the hippo dies, Doc, FunJungle’s vet, does an autopsy on the body. Only Martin del Gato, head of operations, was supposed to be in the room. Teddy sneaks in and watches as much as he can from the rafters.
- Teddy realizes that Henry the hippo was murdered by someone and sets about investigating the case himself. His mother is not happy about that or about Teddy sneaking around where he isn’t supposed to be.
- Teddy tries calling the cops to notify them of the animal’s murder. The cop could care less and hangs up so he can go deal with people issues. Someone was lurking outside Teddy’s home and listened to his conversation.
- Someone frees a black mamba (most dangerous snake in the world) from its exhibit in an attempt to take Teddy out of the investigating game and kill him.
- Teddy investigates the Henry case with Summer McCracken, the 13yo daughter of J.J. McCracken (owner of FunJungle and loaded with money). They sneak into the hippo enclosure and swim in hippo poop infested water to look for clues. Teddy is embarrassed that he doesn’t have a swim suit and that Summer quickly sheds her clothes to her undies. After the swim, the longest showers ever are taken.
- Summer likes to sneak away from her bodyguards.
- While investigating with Summer, Teddy winds up with a crush on her. The most time that the two spend together is while they are investigating because Summer has other obligations and bodyguards. At the end of the story, she grabs his hand and holds it.
- After the black mamba incident, Teddy’s mom keeps a close eye on him and tries to divert him from his investigating. Teddy sneaks around to keep investigating because he realizes that no one else is seriously looking into it.
- A tiger is let out of its exhibit during a fancy zoo party. Teddy’s mom dives over the top of him and shields him with her body as the tiger starts pouncing at them. Teddy’s dad shows up in the nick of time to save his family. The tiger then goes off to scare the party guests, but enjoys eating the roasting meat too much to really do anything.
- Teddy’s dad had left his photo shoot in China and traveled for 36 hours to be with his family. Teddy’s mom had called his dad and told him that Teddy was in trouble.
- Teddy and his parents go about investigating the Henry case. They sneak into the administration building where they were not supposed to be. They saw the plans for finishing the construction of FunJungle with amusement park rides going through the animal exhibits (horrible idea for many reasons). FunJungle security shows up and arrests Teddy’s parents.
- Teddy runs from security. He finds a short refuge with Doc. Apparently Doc had been trying to protect his adult age daughter from being caught for her involvement with an Animal Liberation Front activity of attacking a meat packing plant.
- Some wild animals were being caught to send to the zoo, which is called out as highly illegal. The purpose of those animals was to allow smugglers to put emerald’s inside the animals’ bodies for Martin del Gato to retrieve.
- Teddy is tackled by security in J.J. McCracken’s office. J.J. gives Teddy a chance to explain himself. Teddy puts all of the clues together to clear his parent’s names. J.J. gets mad at everyone for sneaking around, but then is a little embarrassed to be called out for his amusement park plans.
- Breeding animals to increase animal populations is mentioned. Male and female animals are paired. Henry the hippo gave one female hippo low self esteem and would turn against his partner and attempt to mortally wound her. No details are given about what the animals do together.
- Teddy watches a baby hippo being born. The mention of childbirth is that animals are calmer than humans and the hippo lets out a grunt, then pushes, and the baby emerges. No other birth details are offered.
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