Pets on the Loose!
The Great Pet Escape
by Victoria Jamieson
Henry Holt and Company, New York, 2016. 64 pages.
Starred Review
Here’s a graphic novel just right for kids who are ready for chapter books. It’s by the brilliant Newbery-Honor-winning Victoria Jamieson.
This book is about the classroom pets of Daisy P. Flugelhorn Elementary School. GW, a mouse, explains his fate at the beginning:
Three months,
two weeks,
and one day.That’s how long I’ve been stuck in this terrible prison, otherwise known as . . .
a second-grade classroom.I was captured along with my friends Barry and Biter. I haven’t seen them in months. We’re being held in separate cells.
GW has devised a clever plan to escape, including an elaborate contraption to get the door open. When he escapes one night, he goes to rescue Barry, a rabbit, and Biter, a guinea pig, as well.
Barry’s the first grade classroom pet, but he seems to have gone soft in prison. Still, when GW breaks him out, he goes along.
Barry tries to warn GW about Biter:
She’s . . . she’s doing hard time in the worst cell block in this place. Her jailers torture her nearly all the time with stupid songs and crazy behavior . . . .
You don’t mean . . .
Yes, I’m afraid I do . . . .
Biter is in KINDERGARTEN.
Sure enough, Biter has even changed her name to “Sunflower.” She says, “Here in kindergarten, we talk a lot about feelings, and, well . . . I’ve come to realize I have some anger issues.”
Well, that’s the beginning. GW and Barry do convince Sunflower to come along, on the strength of their friendship. But then they meet the fourth grade class pet, Harriet, and her mouse minions. Harriet is planning to sabotage the school lunch.
What follows is a grand and dramatic food fight.
Classroom pets on the loose! Jokes about school! Mayhem in the school cafeteria in the night! All in graphic novel format! There’s not one kid you’ll have to coax to read this book.
And best of all, it shows all the signs of being the first book of a new series, Pets on the Loose!
victoriajamieson.com
mackids.com
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Source: This review is based on a library book from Fairfax County Public Library.
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