Wanted! Criminals of the Animal Kingdom

Detective X is on the trail of 13 criminals from the animal world, and this ursine investigator is sharing their rap sheets with young readers. The miscreants’ crimes range from minor misdeeds, like traffic violations, mischief and disturbing the peace, to more serious wrongs, such as assault, theft and carrying a concealed weapon.

Each of the wanted critters is treated via a pair of facing pages. The left-hand page names the sought-after individual and identifies the crime s/he has committed. A “Criminal Activity” section provides readers with more detail about the specific criminal activity (See above Excerpt). Illustrator Susan Batori provides a cartoon mug shot with the name of the police department actually incorporating where the culprit can normally be found. Ms. Jagged Jaws’ mug shot was taken by the “Ocean Police Dept.” This page also contains a warning for those who might spot the wanted creature. For example, “If you see Ms. Jagged Jaws in the deep sea, call for backup. Do not go into the light.”

On the right-hand page, readers can discern a coloured file folder which is overlaid by a lined sheet of paper that is labeled “RAP SHEET” and which provides information about the wanted culprit under nine categories, beginning with “ALIASES” (common and scientific names), “ANIMAL TYPE”, “DISTINGUISHING FEATURES”, “KNOWN TO EAT”, “LIFE SPAN”, “SIGHTINGS”, “WITNESSES” (a humorous category; for Ms. Jagged Jaws, the entry states: “None. All witnesses have mysteriously disappeared.”), PREVIOUS ARRESTS (also treated humourously; “Three previous arrests, but the judge always disappears before the trial.”) and “GANG NAME”. This last category may appear to be another fun category, but it actually provides the collective name for a group of whatever is under investigation. Consequently, Ms. Jagged Jaws, a fish, is a member of the School Gang.

The Rap Sheet page also provides more of Batori’s artwork in the form of an “evidence photo” that is “paper-clipped” to the file. In the case of Ms. Jagged Jaws, the photo captures her about to “catch” a smaller fish that has been attracted to her “bait”.

Author Tekavec adds a “FYI” text box to the rap sheet via a Batori-crafted “sticky note”. These FYI additions offer further fun information that is related to the wrongdoers. The FYI sticky note for Ms. Jagged Jaws reads:

FYI: The offending anglerfish is known to be female, since the smaller males don’t hunt. Instead, they attach to a female with their small hooked teeth and feed off the female’s blood for their entire lives.

In addition to Ms. Jagged Jaws, readers will also be on the lookout for Copy Cat (a margay cat wanted for identity theft), Big Bad Mama (the common cuckoo accused of bad parenting because of laying her eggs in other birds’ nests), Slippery Slick (a llama whose spitting habits have resulted in a charge of assault), Bubbles (a snapping shrimp whose loud bubble-making abilities disturb the peace), Phony Caponey (a tufted capuchin monkey who creates mischief by hollering “Danger”, when there is none, to scare other monkeys away from food), Baby Face (an antlion larva that digs death traps) Lightfingers (a male satin bowerbird that steals only blue objects to decorate his mating dance area), Queenie the Meanie (a naked mole rat who bullies the other females so that she alone can have babies), The Backyard Burglar (an emerald moth caterpillar that destroys property, specifically flowers), Frogsicle (a wood frog that fakes its own death every winter by stopping its heart before freezing solid), and Lil’ Cupid ( a Roman snail that carries a concealed weapon in the form of a dart containing love hormones). In only one instance is Detective X having to deal with a larger criminal enterprise, and that case involves the Lava Gang, some 40 million Christmas Island red crabs whose annual breeding migration from the forests to the ocean disrupts vehicular traffic.

Visually, Wanted! Criminals of the Animal Kingdom is most attractive, and Batori, whose artwork was rendered in Photoshop, adds numerous little details, such as a coffee cup stain, that contribute to readers’ feeling that they are actually looking at a file sitting on Detective X’s desk. The book is definitely a fun read, one that is filled with engaging information. Who knew that a group of common cuckoos were an asylum or that a bunch of naked mole rats were called a labor?