The Wild Robot
The Wild Robot
By: Peter Brown
This is a book that I picked up on my April book haul. I recognized Peter Brown’s name from Mr. Tiger Goes Wild and thought that I would probably enjoy The Wild Robot. I’m also very curious about how authors write for different age groups—I’m curious about how the author can maintain an authentic voice while changing genre. I also want to do this, so that’s why I am trying to study how different writers do it (this is the same reason I read and reviewed George R.R. Martin’s The Ice Dragon.)
I will say that as an adult, if you were to read this with a group of kids without previewing it first, I would suggest reading the Author’s note at the end first. I didn’t read it first, mostly because I didn’t know it was there, but it was really interesting and definitely helped me form clearer ideas about the story. Basically, in very abridged terms, Brown is interested in how animals follow strict “rules” for how they operate and it’s almost robot like. Think about it, there are things that animals do without anybody telling them—they have instincts that are hardwired into them. And robots are also programmed to behave a certain way.
So what happens when you put a robot into a situation with only animals? Brown put it much more elegantly, but it is an intriguing idea. I would not have kids read the Author’s note first, because I think you would want them to experience the story and draw their own conclusions. But it’s nice as an adult to take a cue from the writer.
The Wild Robot is about a robot that is stranded on an island because a shipment of robots is shipwrecked. A group of otters accidently activates Roz, the robot. The rest of the story is how she survives on the island. She adapts and learns as she goes. She adopts a gosling and becomes an awesome mother, who would have seen that coming?
As I was preparing for this review I was thinking about how Roz’s “birth” mimics that of the gosling. She is the only robot in the shipment that survives, just like the gosling is the only one to survive from its family. They are an unconventional family, and in some ways this book is about adoption. Roz learns how to help the gosling become a goose, and she strives to create a home from him that is safe and as natural as possible.
A lot happens in this book—surviving the winter, flying south, a robot invasion, and so on. It’s a cool story about learning how to adapt and survive through observing those around you.
It’s a good story, and I think that it teaches a lot of valuable lessons without being overwhelming and hard to swallow. I like how I could tell that this was definitely written by the same author that wrote Mr. Tiger Goes Wild—and it was just as thought provoking. (Now I need to get a copy of that book and review it too!)
I also need to briefly mention the illustrations. Even though this book is a chapter book intended for middle grade readers, it does include some excellent illustrations. I like that Peter Brown is able to write and illustrate his own stories. I wish that I could do that for my own books, but I appreciate his ability to do so.
