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Mr. Ape
Mr. Ape | Dick King-Smith
1 post | 1 read
Archibald Peregrine Edmund Spring-Russell ("Ape," for short) is thrilled to be living alone for the first time in his life. Now he can finally fill his fifteen-bedroom house exactly as he pleases -- with twelve big brown hens! But Ape doesn't stop there. Soon there are guinea pigs in the dining room, canaries in the music room, and a talking parrot in the kitchen. Lucky for Ape, he has friends like Joe and Jake -- two Gypsies whose caravan is parked nearby -- to lend a helping hand. But when an accident leaves his mansion in ruins, Ape will have to decide what's truly important... his old house or his new friends.
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review
TheAromaofBooks
Mr. Ape | Dick King-Smith
post image
Mehso-so

King-Smith wrote some odd little books, and this is one of them. It starts out engagingly, with a rich elderly man living in a giant house by himself and spontaneously deciding to get some pets since he was never "allowed" to have them by his overbearing wife. What better place to put them than in his house? So chickens in the living room and bunnies in the dining room, etc. I could see this part really appealing to younger readers. But then ⬇️

TheAromaofBooks (cont'd) the story gets a little muddled. He's hired a single dad who, along with his son, lives in a caravan because they are gypsies (their wagon is pulled by a horse, so I honestly have no idea when this book is supposed to be set), but many of the people in the town are prejudiced against them. In the end, the father and son decide to move on because so many people in town are treating them poorly - and Mr. Ape buys his own caravan and ⬇ 12mo
TheAromaofBooks (cont'd) travels with them! The pacing was just really odd, and while King-Smith makes it obvious that the father and son are actually really good, kind people, no one other than Mr. Ape ever realizes that, and it felt a bit sad that they were just forced to move on. I was hoping that Mr. Ape's acceptance of them would help the townspeople see that they were wrong, but apparently not. It was also weird because we spend a bunch of the book with ⬇ 12mo
TheAromaofBooks (cont'd) him collecting pets, then he gives almost all of them away! It wasn't a bad story, just rather disjointed, as though he couldn't decide exactly what story he wanted to write.

#Roll100 - 48 @PuddleJumper
#MtTBR
#ReadySetRead - Rabbit on Cover @Clwojick
#ISpyBingo - Smile, Rabbit, Handwritten Font
#100YearsofBooks
#ThingsinCommon with The Death of Mrs. Westaway - both in England
12mo
Clwojick Woohoo! Look at those prompts! 12mo
TheAromaofBooks @Clwojick - I know, I wasn't going to review this one because I didn't really like it that much, but it checked off so many prompts! 😂 12mo
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