Hippopotamister

Hippopotamister
By John Patrick Green
:01 First Second, 2016. 84 p.

The zoo is in trouble! People aren’t coming to visit and the animals aren’t being taken care of as they should be. Red Panda (Hippo’s neighbor at the zoo) decides it is time to go out into the world to do something other than living at the zoo. Red Panda often comes back to tell Hippo just how wonderful the outside world is. Soon Hippo decides to become a Hippopotamister (a hippo pretending to be a human and get a human job out in the real world). Job after job Hippo carefully tries his best—while Red Panda does such a “great” job that both eventually are fired. Red Panda’s optimism keeps them going from job to job while Hippo seems to just be along for the ride. Eventually Hippo realizes just what this Hippopotamister should do (and with the details of the run-down zoo at the beginning of the story and the choices of jobs that the animals “try” readers will not be surprised or disappointed with Hippo’s decision). With great full-color illustrations and simple panel designs, this is a great book for young readers who want to start reading graphic novels but are intimidated by large amounts of panel work. Another great new graphic novel.

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