The Last Zookeeper: (A Wordless Environmental Adventure Picture Book About a Futuristic Noahs Ark and Endangered Animal Rescue - For Kids Ages 5-9 in Grades K-4)

by Aaron Becker, Aaron Becker (Illustrator)

Overview

A master of the wordless form imagines a futuristic Noah’s Ark in a luminous sci-fi parable for our changing world.

The Earth has flooded. The only signs of humankind are the waterlogged structures they left behind. Peeking out from the deluge are the remnants of a zoo, home to rare and endangered animals, survivors of long neglect. Tender-hearted NOA is a construction robot who’s found new purpose as the caretaker of the zoo’s beleaguered inhabitants. Bracing for the next storm, NOA builds an ark from the wreckage in search of new land and a new home, only to discover something even more profound. With boundless compassion and sweeping scenes of sea and sky punctuated by detailed wordless panels to pore over, Caldecott Honor–winning creator Aaron Becker delivers a timely and concrete message about the rewards of caring in even the most difficult of times that is sure to inspire the dreamers among us.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781536227680
Publisher:	Candlewick Press
Publication date:	03/26/2024
Pages:	40
Product dimensions:	9.50(w) x 10.90(h) x 0.50(d)
Age Range:	5 - 9 Years

About the Author

Aaron Becker is the best-selling author of the award-winning Journey trilogy and other books for children young and old, including The Tree and the River and A Stone for Sascha. When he’s not home with his wife and two daughters, he can be found creating something new in his backyard studio in western Massachusetts.

Editorial Reviews

Minute details pepper each scene, giving sharp-eyed readers the chance to find something new every time they page through this book. . . True fans will find themselves poring over these pictures for hours. Epic storytelling erupts on the page without the use of a single word. Superb.
—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

This beguiling ark story, splendidly drafted in wordless spreads, stars a robot zookeeper who combines the spare-parts body of Wall-E with the gentle bearing of Amos McGee. . . underscores the power of practical measures, and holds out the promise of hope.
—Publishers Weekly (starred review)

This wordless picture book invites repeat readings to catch the intricate artistic details—clever and thoughtful decisions about color, perspective, and framing result in a visual treasure. The fact that everything centers on the zoo mirrors a sci-fi Noah’s Ark that prioritizes saving what can be saved (indeed, the robot’s only designation is “nöa” on its arm).
—The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books (starred review)

The master of wordless picture books returns with this moving retelling of Noah’s ark that speaks to an uncertain future.
—Foreword Reviews (starred review)

Becker’s characteristically virtuosic ink and watercolor paintings offer much for young readers to pore over and peer at. . . Others will find the story and the questions it poses lingering long after the book is closed.
—The Horn Book

Wordless, yet carries a timely, vital message. Five years ago, I would have called this sci-fi. Today, I call it our reality. The wordless format will invoke such meaningful conversations among people of all ages.
—Lorie Barber, Anderson’s Bookshop

From the Publisher

★ 06/14/2024

PreS-Gr 3—Caldecott Honoree Becker (Journey) reimagines Noah's tale as a robot in a post-apocalyptic world seemingly devoid of human life. NOA, a turbine-powered robot that dwarfs the animals he cares for, carefully separates the carnivorous tigers from the elephants, giraffes, and hippos as he feeds them each day. Flamingos fly and perch on the tender NOA, who returns to his shelter at night to build small boats. Becker's art is highly detailed, using watercolor defined by pen and ink that invite inquiry and discussion. NOA bears a dove decal, and the animals are surrounded by buildings with carved animal shapes, suggesting the area was once a zoo. When water rises, NOA builds a large ship for the animals and sets sail with a hope that is rewarded. Each small movement of NOA conveys emotion and the value of caring for our planet. NOA's loneliness, his horror over the rising water, his concern—all are palpable. Although the main story is wordless, this quotation by Jane Goodall appears before the title page: "Only if we understand, can we care. Only if we care, can we help. Only if we help, shall all be saved." There are beautiful applications for using this title in the classroom and library to jumpstart projects on conservation. Older readers will experience complex feelings watching NOA care for the world in a way so many humans do not. VERDICT A wordless picture book with so much to say, this is one for all children, and all collections.—Rachel Zuffa

School Library Journal

★ 2023-12-06
Caldecott Honoree Becker’s dystopian imaginings once more find fruit in picture-book format.

The biblical Noah as a gargantuan robot? Stranger things have been conceived of. In flooded lands replete with incredibly detailed architecture (think David Macaulay meets WALL-E’s world) but with no humans in sight, a towering yellow robot, the word NOA on its arm, powered by wind turbines from its back, sets forth to collect all the animals of the world. The waters rise to NOA’s knees, but still our robotic avatar collects with infinite kindness every giraffe, panda, tiger, and elephant it can find. The crumbling world around them hints at the zoos and circuses where once these creatures made their homes. Now, they sail away with NOA on a boat built by the automaton. This wordless tale outlines their struggles, from storm to shipwreck and, ultimately, to hope. The allusions to both Noah’s Ark and Eden are sly but ever present, set as they are against Becker’s sumptuous watercolor and pen-and-ink backdrops. Here, the very existence of life on Earth hangs in the balance, and the stakes have never been higher. Minute details pepper each scene, giving sharp-eyed readers the chance to find something new every time they page through this book (like the fact that the meat-eating tigers are kept in their own separate cage on the robot’s boat). True fans will find themselves poring over these pictures for hours.

Epic storytelling erupts on the page without the use of a single word. Superb. (Picture book. 4-7)

Kirkus Reviews