Review of "The Great Animal Escape" by Linda Harkey, Illustrated by Jeff Yesh, Narrated by Stewart Davis

Paperback Score: 95/100 (9.5 out of 10)
Audiobook Score: 95/100 (9.5 out of 10)

As far as children's & middle-grade books are concerned, The Great Animal Escape may be Linda Harkey and Jeff Yesh's magnum opus—their masterpiece!

We now have the privilege of reviewing the audiobook version of this adorable and fun story as narrated by Stewart Davis, another talented young prodigy!

This book and audiobook are remarkable in a lot of ways. First of all, this book exemplifies Linda Harkey's unique (and peculiar) storytelling & character-crafting style the best. It's random, unpredictable, chaotic, whimsical, lighthearted, and fun! It's like a battle royal with different characters and random troubles flying here, there, and everywhere!

We've read a lot of the books in Linda Harkey's catalog of children's books: Desert Friends, Chatty the Hen Pheasant, and The Remarkable Story of Willie the Crow.

We've gathered that you can't take them overly seriously. At the same time, buried deep beneath the silliness, goofiness, randomness, and humor, we've noticed that Harkey loves to weave beautiful little themes, lessons, and topics.

One theme or topic that plays again and again in Harkey's books is the idea of acceptance and understanding. Often playing alongside that is the idea of setting aside our differences and looking at the things we have in common (that unite us): things like a need and desire for companionship, friendship, social bonds, connections, and even something as simple as a love for food—even when we don't always agree on the kinds of foods we like. For example, Rodney and Quincy disagree on whether or not tarantulas and lizards are edible in Desert Friends. However, they can still be friends and enjoy their time together.

Well, The Great Animal Escape tactfully and effectively demonstrates this idea of unlikely camaraderie and friendship in a fun and entertaining way!

The book features a sprawling cast of diverse characters—the most diverse cast of characters in Harkey's books by far! This includes the Lova-Bull (a strong red Hereford bull), Mud Pie (a black Angus cow), Gracie (a burro), Bernie (a raven chick), and Blue Moon (an old bilingual raven).

However, these adorable, interesting, and charismatic characters aren't just defined by the species or kind of animal they are. They—like real-life human beings—are unique and special in their own ways!

Lova-Bull and Mud Pie are romantically involved and protective of each other. In fact, they are kind of the instigators of the whole escape and adventure as they decide to run away together to avoid becoming hamburger meat. You can really tell and feel the love and care they have for each other. Lova-Bull is protective of Mud Pie. Meanwhile, Mud Pie finds comfort and reassurance in Lova-Bull. You can tell that there's love, trust, and care there.

With that said, they're both goofballs who are maybe a little less intellectually gifted than a standard human. Lova-Bull, while brave and courageous is also impulsive and prone to doing reckless things like charging barbed wire and even a big blue truck! Don't worry, it's not graphic or violent, but it does exemplify both his good and not-so-good traits.

Also, it could be argued that their entire reason for running away may have been a misunderstanding or misinterpretation of a benign cooking school.

Bernie seems to be the eyes and ears of the book, acting a bit like a narrator. Bernie is too small to directly and physically impact most events. He's also young, inexperienced, and still learning up from down. In other words, he's observing and gathering information from the wild events of this book as best as he can. He's making sense of this information as best as he can. But the reader is probably smart to things that he and the other animals aren't. For example, a savvy reader will recognize that the "blue monster" is actually just a truck.

Bernie does have a gift besides being curious. He also has a good sense of smell, eventually being able to lead the other animals to water.

Gracie is arguably the coolest character in the book. She's the hardcore, no-nonsense girl boss who all the other animals turn to when they need a big problem solved. She's not afraid to go toe-to-toe with a big hungry mountain lion!

Speaking of big hungry mountain lions, we get a fun little antagonist in this book named Huntress, a mountain lion who stalks and hunts the other animals from around page 29 onward. But Huntress combines traits of both Nassau (the hunting dog) and Chatty (the hen pheasant that Nassau catches) from Chatty the Hen Pheasant. Like Nassau, Huntress is a hunter and a predator. However, simultaneously, like Chatty, she's also a mother—the mother of two adorable cubs who actually stop and have a fun little chat with Bernie.

Their chat is made all the more hilarious and comedic by the fact that both Gracie and Bernie's mother ("Ma") are engaged in mortal combat with Huntress while the kids are just talking.

From this chat between Bernie and the cubs, we learn a bit about Huntress. She's a loving mother who has struggled to find food for her and her kids. This is her opportunity to provide for them. So, she's not evil or bad, she's just doing what she needs to do as a mother and a living being. She needs to eat just like everyone does.

This book develops a surprising amount of empathy for the characters as well as fleshing out their independent motivations. You get the sense that some of the characters don't really need to be there (it's not necessary for their survival), but they're there either because they think it's the right thing to do (to protect their friends), are curious, and/or because they enjoy the company of the other animals.

One thing we probably didn't fully appreciate the first time we read this is how substantial and long this book is. It's an 80-something-page middle-grade chapter book (appropriate for maybe ages 8-12). So, it covers a lot of ground.

It's incredibly random. Characters go from fleeing life-and-death situations to talking about how they need to eat 20 lbs. of grass a day, to celebrating a lightning storm, to fighting off a mountain lion and a truck. There isn't a linear story. Characters come and go (like Blue Moon and even Bernie, a major character who just picks up and leaves about 4/5ths of the way through). Problems come and go. It can be both fun and tedious since you're never quite sure if the events or characters you're reading about actually matter in the grand scheme of things. Are we ever gonna see Huntress again and resolve her arc? What's with Blue Moon? Is he just a messenger who instigates stuff by carrying news from elsewhere?

Moving on...

The audiobook is delightfully narrated by a young prodigy named Stewart Davis. Stewart clearly had a big task ahead of him—probably Harkey's longest children's book—and he took on this monumental task bravely, courageously, and commendably!

He clearly has talent, possesses an above-average reading ability, and is certainly going places in the future!

We did notice a notable tremor in his voice, particularly in the opening chapters. It sounded a bit like he was nervous. With time and practice, this will naturally go away. Even adults get nervous when reading something aloud and having cameras and microphones pointed at us. Could you imagine a kid being confronted with recording an 80+ page audiobook? He passed with flying colors!

Stewart did some incredible, impressive things in this book. Most notably, he voices both Lova-Bull and Mud Pie with spot on Southern accents! Lova-Bull possesses a the cowboy-esque Southern drawl while Mud Pie sounds like a Southern belle!

Another nice little Easter egg at the conclusion is when Stewart sings a variation of "Old McDonald Had a Farm" as an example for a book-related activity! It's sweet and unexpected. He went above and beyond!

Check it out on Amazon!