The Wild Robot

Author:  Peter Brown

Begun: June 5th 2025

Finished: June 5th 2025

Type: Audiobook on Libby

Narrator: Lupita Nyong'o

Rating: 3/10 Hard DNF

Warning!!!  Spoilers ahead!  This review is extremely spoilery!

This came highly recommended, so I was excited.  It's written for ages 8 and up so I thought it would be a sweet, fast read.

Nope.

I got about 1/4 of the way through, and my salient emotions were horror, disgust, boredom, and irritation.  Even my younger self would have hated this book.  I feel a great swell of pity for any child who has had this read to them, or who has read it themselves. 

I went online to see if it were worth sticking with.  Not only did the book get WORSE, it ends on a cliffhanger!!  

I. Hate. Cliffhangers.

1. I like the robot.  Dislike the name though.

2. I am horrified that the book begins when robots - remember the main character is a robot so we're meant to feel attached to them - are graphically smashed to pieces on rocks.  WTF?

3. I was disgusted by the overt carnivorous behaviour of the fox.  Yeah, I know that's life, I just don't want to read about it thank you.  Made me nauseous.

4. The rejection of the robot in the beginning was really negative.

5. Opossums gross me out.

6. The death of the geese and eggs.  WTaF??????

7. Then I read at the end that the robot leaves the baby goose behind????  WHAT???

So let's look at the themes in this "kids" book:

- graphic death

- killing of live animals

- rejection by society

- killing of innocent things

- abandonment by parental figures. 

FAUGH!

I hard DNFd the book and returned it immediately.

Naturally YMMV.  I think many people love this book.  I'm just the weirdo who hated it.