This Zoo is Not for You

When the platypus arrives at the zoo in the platybus, a mistake is made, and the animals think he has come for an interview to be accepted into the zoo.  Each of the interviews is conducted by animals:  a panda, flamingos, monkeys, chameleons and an elephant.  They are terribly unkind about the Platypus and rather indifferent.  He is too small and plain; he doesn’t eat bamboo, and certainly isn’t elegant or graceful; he can’t do tricks nor change colours, and the elephant thinks he’s ‘weird’.  The little Platypus is rather taken aback about all this as all he wanted to do was to deliver an invitation to a platypus party on the platybus.  With his head high, he retreats to the bus.  When the animals find the left-behind invitation, they realise what they have done and that they have been unkind.  Off they go to apologise and to be accepted as friends into a bus load of partying platypuses.  This is an excellent story about accepting people as they are, their differences and their strengths and not making instant assumptions.  The platypus comes out best because he is willing to forgive the unkindness of the too-sure-of-themselves animals.  The animals’ expressions say it all, as does the platypus’s face when being bombarded with poo by the monkeys!  There is lots of space in the illustrations, and the animals are very much centre stage while the pastel backgrounds add to the colourfulness of the whole.  An excellent story full of rhyme sets the scene perfectly for the big party at the end:  ‘The platybus is for all of us!’