The One and Only Bob
Series: One and Only Ivan, Book 2
By: Katherine Applegate / Narrated By: Danny DeVito
Length: 3 hrs and 50 mins
Slow-going, and not quite as hard-hitting, but things doooo wind up well with this sequel
Ain’t gonna lie: The One and Only Bob is nowhere neeeear as poignant as The One and Only Ivan, but my sincere love for each of the characters, animal or human, had me jumping on this audiobook as soon as it was released. Bob, Ivan’s scrambling and scrabbling canine friend is our main character, so we get to hear what his new life is like, along with his memories of life amongst the humans prior to meeting up with Ivan.
To Bob, humans can mean salvation, or just as often? Humans can bring suffering and death to an animal in need. Fortunately for Bob, at the story’s opening, we meet him after he’s become somewhat chubby from too many cheese treats, and he’s a much-loved member of a family, with young Julia seeing to his every need and taking him to the Zoo to visit with Ivan the gorilla and Ruby the baby elephant.
Life is good, but Bob ponders how all this affects his sense of being free. He’s a pampered pet, but he refuuuuses to be trained, cannot STAND the clicker Julia is adamant about using. And so all goes on, for eeeeons, and this is what I mean by slow-going. It’s not until Bob is caught up dealing with a hurricane with devastating winds and flooding, an emergency that brings destruction and loss, that the story really gets going. Add to that, most of the audiobook, tho’ BRILLIANTLY narrated by Danny DeVito, is broken down into itty bitty bite-sized bits, not really chapters so much as: This is what you’ll be hearing, as a title, followed by the exact thing stated happening and then all moves onto the NEXT bit, all of this taking anywhere from 10 seconds to 4 minutes tops.
I don’t like that… to me, it truly interrupted the flow where author Katherine Applegate COULD’ve been using her razor-sharp writing skills to challenge the listener, do some teaching, touch our hearts. At least there’s a huge amount of messaging going on, making us wonder about how we view animals, how we view what’s important in life, how we view our own actions not to mention how we deal with our greatest sorrows and regrets. As Bob’s big sister Boss is introduced, we find that Bob has never forgiven himself for not saving the sole surviving sibling from that highway their entire litter was hurled upon. Bob’s freedom, back when he was living with Ivan, was used in trips back to the highway to look for her, to mourn her passing, to beat himself up well and truly for not showing courage.
But Applegate makes sure that in this book, Bob has plenty of opportunities to display courage, to meet duties of honor tho’ they make him curse the Fates (This was something I reeeeally laughed at, seeing as I meet EVERY homeless creature finding me and needing help, and I shake my fist at the sky, wondering why someone ELSE can’t be sought out!). Yes, things do start picking up steam as the story and environmental emergencies come into play, and at that point the story became unputdownable.
And Danny DeVito! AWEsome performance, capturing Bob’s swagger, capturing his vulnerability, capturing his desire to meet things head-on, nope—run from them, nope—meet them head-on, nope—run like heck. Not too sure about the voice he used for Ivan, but sadly Ivan didn’t get a whole heckuva lot of airtime in this story, which is probably another reason I thought Ivan’s book was better, more emotionally evocative (NOTHING can devastate the heartstrings like a lonely animal, entombed and stared at for decades, so sorrowful).
All in all, however, a charming story. And when I saw it was released, I thought it might be nice to listen to it, thinking of my Mom the whole time. She’s a grand lover of animals, of stories of affection and adventure. Her heart’s as big as the world, so maaaaybe she’d like this story, a mutt from the wrong side of the tracks, coming to terms with life, love, and loss?
Dunno… What do ya think, Maman?
As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.