An animal adventure story with science-fiction overtones
Ten-year old Joe and a young gerbil called Sophie take turns narrating this funny and fast-paced story about a machine that can shrink anything (and anybody) to a tenth of its original size. How can this machine help gerbils win the respect of other rodents? And, for a human, how does it feel to be gerbil-sized?
An animal adventure story with science-fiction overtones
Ten-year old Joe and a young gerbil called Sophie take turns narrating this funny and fast-paced story about a machine that can shrink anything (and anybody) to a tenth of its original size. How can this machine help gerbils win the respect of other rodents? And, for a human, how does it feel to be gerbil-sized?
Zapped is about a boy named Joe who is given his Uncle's gerbil as he is leaving to travel and can't take his pet along with him. Despite having a sibling, Joe is a bit lonely, so is happy to meet Fluffy the Gerbil. At the same time, readers are introduced to an underworld of gerbil rescuers, including Sophie, the young leader of a team of free gerbils, who help pet gerbils escape from their lives as pets.
Joe's dad is an inventor, busy in his workshop, always working on the next big invention, and doesn't have much time to spend with them. His Dad has most recently invented a machine that can shrink things, such as furniture, clothing and cars and has now figured out how to reverse the shrinking.
As Joe takes care of his uncle's gerbil, his world ends up colliding with the secret gerbil rescue society. He helps the gerbil community and town through his Dad's zapping machine; however, they soon realize that the items that have been zapped and made miniature for the gerbils might not stay so tiny. This puts Joe's Dad's success in peril and causes panic in the gerbil community.
I will say that it is a cute book for kids. The author handled the back-and-forth between Joe's viewpoints and the gerbils reasonably well. I liked the little drawings of Joe and Gerbils that helped to show where the transitions were, and I think kids will appreciate that.
However, this read too closely to Honey, I Shrunk the Kids in terms of the underlying storyline for me. An inventor Dad, a family with money troubles, shrinking furniture, and shrinking kids and animals, ending with the shrinking machine not working out perfectly. I might have enjoyed it more if I hadn't known that other story, so kids might find this book fun and easy to read.