That's Not a Hippopotamus! by Juliette MacIver and Sarah Davis
| That's Not a Hippopotamus! by Juliette MacIver and Sarah Davis | |
|
| |
| Category: For Sharing | |
| |
Reviewer: Sam Tyler
 | |
| Summary: When a Hippo goes missing in the zoo all the children decide to help in this wonderfully illustrated children's book that struggles a little with its wording. | |
| Buy? Maybe | Borrow? Yes |
| Pages: 32 | Date: October 2016 |
| Publisher: Gecko Press | |
| External links: Author's website | |
| ISBN: 9781927271964 | |
|
Share on: | |
|
| |
With the onset of TV, the internet and colourful books we take for granted that we know what different animals look like. A giraffe has a long neck, a lion has big teeth and a Dodo does not look like much anymore. However, imagine a time before all this technology, the closest you would get to an exotic animal might be the assorted stuffed creatures in a local Natural History Museum. Perhaps the children of Juliette MacIver and Sarah Davis' That's Not a Hippopotamus! learned from some poor taxidermy, as they sure don't know what a Hippo looks like.
When a teacher takes her class to the Zoo she does not expect them to be entangled in a hunt for a missing Hippopotamus. This being a group of pugnacious 5 year olds, they are not always the best of help. Will they ever find the Hippo when the kids can't tell the difference between a large lumbering grey beast with a skunk, snake or even a Sea Cow? (At least that one is a little close)
There are several elements that must all work together to make a great children's book and whilst Hippopotamus has some of them, it does not feature all. On a positive note, this is a very attractive book. Davis' illustrations are fantastic. Each page is packed with things to look at, such as small animals in the background. The characters are wonderfully realised, the children in particular are cute and very amusing.
The book itself also has a solid central idea – mistaking one animal for another. This certainly leads to some funny moments as the children turn up with outlandish animals that could not possibly be the right answer. Davis adds even more fun by having a particularly rotund stranger hanging around in the background looking a little suspicious and Hippoesque.
With all these elements in place Hippopotamus should be a no brainer, but unfortunately the text just does not scan very well. The premise with MacIver's words is that Miss links loosely with Hippopotamus. You are jarred into saying it almost every double spread and it does not sit well. A small child will even be able to pick up that you are struggling a little to make the words mesh. Rhyming couplets and word games are the foundation of many fantastic children's books and they are a building block of the genre. To build your story on poor foundations is never going to work.
The fact that the words are a little painful to utter is a real shame as they do a disservice to the great work that Davis put into the illustrations. The drawings of the children are supremely charming and the pages are packed with enough things to look at that the book still entertains. It is just that it will never be a must-have when you can feel what you are reading is a little off.
Hippos are a stalwart of the For Sharing genre; see Violet by Annie Taylor or When I Woke Up I Was A Hippopotamus by Tom MacRae and Ross Collins for a couple of examples.
Please share on: 
Facebook, 
Twitter and
Instagram
You can read more book reviews or buy That's Not a Hippopotamus! by Juliette MacIver and Sarah Davis at Amazon.co.uk Amazon currently charges £2.99 for standard delivery for orders under £20, over which delivery is free.
You can read more book reviews or buy That's Not a Hippopotamus! by Juliette MacIver and Sarah Davis at Amazon.com.
Comments
Like to comment on this review?
Just send us an email and we'll put the best up on the site.
