– reviewed by Brooke Anderson, 10 –
When 14 year old Sophie’s parents split up, she finds herself living with her dad in the USA. She returns to the Congo for vacations and stays with her mother who runs a bonobo sanctuary. Bonobos are black, highly intelligent apes, and our closet ‘relative’.
The Congo is a dangerous place. You never know what might be round the next corner – fake policemen, poachers and hungry people who would hunt the bonobo for their meat or for superstition. Before she has even arrived at the sanctuary on this visit, Sophie breaks one of her mother’s golden rules when she gives a trafficker money in exchange for a tiny, scabby baby bonobo.
Sophie names her new friend ‘Otto’ as he has just eight fingers. Baby bonobos need to be with their mothers constantly or they will die. The sanctuary has a nursery where local women are employed to be mamas to the orphaned babies. The plan is that Otto will go to the nursery when the time comes for Sophie to go back home.
There is a release site near Mbandaka many miles away, where the healthy adult bonobos can be taken and returned to the wild. This involves a very long journey by road and river, and it is where Sophie’s mother is heading when war breaks out. The area of the sanctuary is invaded by the Kata-kata, soldiers who have deserted the army, and Sophie is in real danger. This part of the book was very exhilarating. Frightening and exciting at the same time. Sophie was in danger from the soldiers and from the adult Bonobos. She has no one to look out for her and Otto needs her to keep him safe. Only by being resourceful and smart can Sophie stay alive and care for Otto.
I would recommend this book as it taught me a lot about the area and Congolese culture. The Bonobo is an endangered species and hopefully ‘Endangered’ will bring attention to them. I was also intrigued that it was written by a man from the point of view of a young girl.
New Releases – Available at The Children’s Bookshop:
Board Books:
Lots of Kisses by Lorna Crozier
You are my Baby by Lorena Siminovich
Picture Books:
Uni the Unicorn by Amy Krouse Rosenthal
Horton & the Kwuggerbug & more lost stories by Dr Seuss
Middle Reader:
The Magic Half by Annie barrows
Space Rocks by Tom O’ Donnell
Older Reader:
Pathfinder by Angie Sage
Blood of Olympus by Rick Riordan
Endgame by James Frey
