Changes

''Half Brother'' is set in the 1970s and based on real research. Nim Chimpsky - you might not like the idea of such experiments, but you have to admit that's a funny pun - was raised in a human household, taught ASL, and eventually pronounced as having failed to learn language, just like Zan. I wouldn't consider myself as a militant about animal rights, or even particularly sentimental about animals, but I found this book incredibly difficult to read. Oppel makes it clear from the outset that the experiment isn't going to end well and I felt an ever-increasing sense of dread and pity as I read. Heartbreakingly, the flaws are clear to Ben - the not-particularly-academic, hormonal teenager - but not to his brilliant parents. Ben can see the contradictions and the cruelty as Zan is treated as a human one moment and an animal the next. His father sees only a test subject. His mother probably sees more, but indulges in handwringing self-justifications instead of facing up to things. They both spend most of the book utterly failing as parents, both for boy and chimp.