Zola's Elephant (Review #2), written by Randall De Sève, reviewed by Klaudia Janek

Student Reviewer: Ovidiu M.
Summary: The book Zola’s elephant is about the main character, a very curious girl who has a new neighbor, a girl named Zola. The girl sees a big box, and begins to assume that there is an elephant in there. Throughout the story, the girl hears more and more things and assumes that Zola is playing with her elephant. She imagines crazy things, such as the elephant and Zola making a cozy clubhouse, or that they are taking a bath together. It is very unrealistic that this would happen, with an elephant being able to fit inside a house, let alone be playing someone. In the end, the girl goes over to Zola’s new house to play with her and her elephant, and ends up finding out that there was no elephant after all, and ends up making friends with Zola and playing with her instead.

Straight Talk for Librarians: This book is a good book to have in a school library, and to put somewhere up front for easy access for the kids to check out and take home to read. It can be used as a read aloud story for a class, to teach kids that they should not make unnecessary assumptions, and to not be shy and build confidence. The colored pencil drawings and mixed media fit right in with the geared approach to children, with the bright, vibrant colors and the elephants, which attract the attention of little kids. The emotions that are conveyed are emotions of sadness at first, and loneliness, but at the end of the story, the mood turns back into a happy theme, where everyone is happy and friends with each other and everything is happily ever after. This book can also be used by parents to read to children as a bedtime story, so it can be used outside of class also. Overall, I really enjoyed this book and I highly recommend it to other readers.