Customer Reviews

Zoobreak

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I have a 10 year old son who has Aspergers. As a result, reading has not been something he has embraced. He loves non-fiction books about animals but mostly because he will look at the pictures and read the captions. As a result, his reading has been consistently behind grade level and he has never been interested in reading fiction -- where my older son devoured the Magic Treehouse books, my younger son found them "too hard" and didn't hold his interest.

Yesterday, he picked out this book from the school book fair. I was surprised he picked it out because it is long and it is fiction (no pictures to speak of). But apparently they had a video that made him want the book.

We started reading it last night and for the most part, he is able to read it with little help. It is funny right from the start -- I was even enjoying it and wanted to know what happens next. The chapters are short so that it makes it very easy for him to read some and have a good stopping place yet feel like he has accomplished something.

But the most amazing thing about this book -- he actually picks it up to read on his own -- without needing an adult there to read with him. He is motivated and interested in the book enough to want to keep reading to see what happens -- to me, the very definition of whether a book is good. For a kid where reading doesn't come easily -- for him to want to put in the time and the effort to keep reading it is nothing short of a miracle and makes me want to sing the books (and author's) praises from the rooftops.

For every kid who eventually grows up to love reading, there will be ONE special book that gets them into reading. The humor, the kid-friendly format, the characters, and the subject all combine to make this THE ONE book for my son and I'm thrilled!

I think my son summed it up the best when he quoted Sam from iCarly: "Hey Mom! Sam's right!! This is just like TV inside your brain!"

[NCJAR]

this book is the sequel to swindle, it is about the same group of kids, this time it involves a monkey, a trained attack owl and a plan, Savannah Drysdales monkey, Cleopatra is kidnapped from her back yard with a banana and then at schoool they go on a field trip at schoool and they visit a floating zoo only to reveal that is an awful enviornment for the animals and worst of all a certain kidnapped monkey seems to be there, how will the team figure this one out?!

Eleven-year-old Griffin Bing is known throughout Cedarville, New York as "The Man with the Plan." Recently, he and his friends had gotten tangled up in a mess involving a stolen Babe Ruth baseball card. Since that crisis has been resolved safely, Griffin has been on the lookout for another adventure, and he doesn't have to look very far. His good pal, Savannah, to put it mildly, is an animal enthusiast: she loves every creature and can recite all sorts of information on just about every one. She even has her own pet capuchin monkey, but to her horror, he goes missing, breaking her heart.

Griffin and his best friend, Ben, help her search for her monkey, but the boys find nothing. It isn't until their class goes on a field trip to a visiting zoo on a boat that they make a horrific discovery --- the "All Aboard Animals" floating zoo has Savannah's monkey locked up in a horrible cage. And what makes it even worse is that the entire zoo is dirty, and the animals are skinny and obviously miserable. Savannah tries to get her monkey back, but the zoo's operator swears he is the legal owner. There's nothing Savannah, her parents, or her parents' lawyer can do.

But there is something Griffin and his friends can do --- Operation Zoobreak! Everyone on the team has a special talent, like Pitch and her climbing abilities, Logan with his acting skills, and Melissa, who knows everything about computers. A person by himself or herself is alone, but a group of friends working together can accomplish anything. The team gets started right away on their plan to sneak aboard the floating zoo and rescue the monkey. Of course, things never go completely according to plan, and at the last minute, Savannah decides they should save every creature in the zoo. It's a good thing that Griffin is so talented with plans; they're going to need some good ones.

Gordon Korman has written a number of awesome books, and ZOOBREAK is yet another winner. He has a wild sense of humor, and his characters are colorful and entertaining. Griffin and his friends are so much fun; the pages flew by in a huge, hilarious adventure. This book is overflowing with energy, and each chapter ends with the promise of more excitement. In addition, woven perfectly into the story, without sounding preachy or lectured, are the themes of friendship, working together, accomplishing the impossible, and having the courage to do what is right. I can't wait to read more adventures involving Griffin and his friends.

--- Reviewed by Chris Shanley-Dillman

Griffin Bing, The Man With a Plan, and his fellow felonious sixth graders are back in this hilarious sequel to Swindle. This time, the gang is up in arms when Savannah's stolen pet monkey, Cleo, turns up in a seedy floating zoo called All Aboard Animals. None of the adults - parents, police, lawyers - can help Savannah, so she turns to the ringleader of the baseball card heist team for help. Griffin hatches his most ingenious and intricate plan yet: Operation Zoobreak. Of course, Griffin's plans always go much more smoothly on paper than they do in real life and Griffin, Ben, Logan, Savannah, Pitch and Melissa soon find themselves in familiar territory - way over their heads!

As a fifth grader reading was never an interest to me, but when it came to a good book this would be in my top ten. Griffen (The man with the plan) is trying to get his friend Savannah (animal lover) monkey out of an unsanitized, disgusting zoo but the problem is Savannah can't help but take all 40 animals with her and now the team has 40 animals on their hands. So is the team going to survive will they be in juvey.
The main theme is this team of kids how are like special forces and do missions that are as hard as they get but this time it is to missions that could put them in jail or walk free. The author really pointed out what they were doing put details in that would put in just like a real situation. I would recommend this to fifth graders and and fourth graders. I hope you may want to read this book someday.

It's a good book. The author certainly has talent.
Kids will enjoy this type of books, that's for certain.
I hope my nephew will enjoy this book like I have.

Zoobreak
This book is number two out of three books about a kid named Griffin and his friends doing some pretty crazy things in this book they break animals out of a zoo. Zoobreak is fun, imaginative, cool, and interesting to read!
Three big parts of the story.
1. Cleopatra goes missing and Griffin and his friends are determined to find her (she is a monkey.)
2. Griffin and his friends find the monkey at a floating zoo but the zookeeper will not give the monkey back.
3. Griffin and his friends have to break into the floating zoo but one of Griffin's friends says"I am staying here unless we break out all the animals". No one wants to do it but they have to.
I rate this book a five for the creativeness, imagination, and for some of the action in it.
I recommend this book to anyone who is a big fan of Gordon Korman; I like her books because of the great word fluency, ideas and content, and imagination. This was a fascinating book! As soon as I picked it up I couldn't stop reading.

I bought two copies of the book. My grandson practices reading out loud with me and I read the second copy with him to assist with pronunciation and comprehension.
The book was a very pleasant read and we learned several new words and shared several laughs as the story progressed and we saw how a mom reacted to the giant "rat" in her basement! It was an enjoyable pleasure to share this story with my grandson. I especially enjoy that he is beginning to enjoy his reading more and more and hope that he will love books as much as I do! The second book has now been passed on to another grandson who I am also sharing the story with!

This book is about a girl named Savannah who loses her monkey, "Cleo". Her friends, Griffin and Ben, take Savannah's dog named, Luther, on a walk around town to places that Cleo liked to visit. Luther the dog found a bannana with Cleon's scent all over it. That's when Savannah realized that Cleo had been kidnapped. The bannana was used to lure Cleo away from their yard.

Later, the kids visited the "All Aboard Animals" floating zoo for a school field trip. They end up seeing Cleo in a cage at the floating zoo. Savannah tells the zookeeper that the monkey is hers. But the zookeepser, Mr. Nastase, says that the monkey is their newest attraction, Eleanor. Savannah knows the monkey is her pet Cleo!

Griffin decides to come up with a plan to rescue Cleo from the floating zoo. He brings his old team of 11 year old friends together, Logan, Antonia, Melissa, Savannah and Ben.

The first time they attempt to rescue Cleo failed. The second attempt to rescue Cleo, they asked Darren to sail them to "All Aboard Animals" because he was a boating expert. Unfortunately, he never showed up for the rescue. They decided to use a row boat they found all by themselves. When they arrived at the zoo and freed Cleo from her cage, Savannah felt sorry for all the other animals because they knew that the zookeepr was abusive. So they ended up freeing all of the animals and brought them back to their homes.

After about a week or so, the animals started to irritate the children. Savannah called another zoo keeper at the Long Island Zoo that she knew to see if she could take care of the animals. Unfortunately, the zookeeper was out of town and wouldn't return for 2 weeks. So the kids decided to take the amimals to the zoo themselves. Meanwhile, the zookeeper from "All Aboard Animals", decided to get his animals back from the other zoo. Mr. Nastase decided to shoot Griffin with a tranquilizer gun. Mr. Nastase's assistant took the shot for Griffin because he didn't like the way Mr. Nastase treated the animals.

Darren, the boy who never showed up for the rescue mission, was dreaming about it and ended up telling his parents about the rescue because they were asking questions. His parents called the other parents of the rescue team and then called the police.

The police arrived and arrested Mr. Nastasi and his assistant. All of the rescued animals ended up at the Long Island Zoo safe and sound.

All of the 11 year rescue team ended up getting grounded for not telling their parents about their rescue mission.

I liked this story because it had alot of action in it. I am also an animal lover and would try to rescue an animal if I thought it was abused. I would recommend it to my friends because it's action packed and makes you want to read more and more!

My son was very excited to receive this book. I will presume it is quite good - I had to confiscate flashlights so that he would actually go to bed, not hide under the cover & read!