My Dog the Dinosaur
Jackie French
Stephen Michael King

HarperCollins 2003
105pp. pbk., $11.95
0207199418

Series: Wacky Families

My dog the dinosaur is about a boy called Gunk who gets a strange looking dog called Spot for his birthday. A dog with a long neck, a flat tail, a dog who is a vegetarian. Later on as spot grows up Gunk realises that amazingly, Spot is a dinosaur. Spot and Gunk learn to care for each other, they have a special bond that soon becomes known.

Then one day Gunk is kidnapped by a group of robbers. Spot will go to desperate measures to save ‘his’ boy.

You will have to read the story to see what happens – in this wild and wacky adventure of the dinosaur dog and his strange named owner!

There are a number of black and white illustrations throughout the story which assist with the plot and add humour to the story. Spot is depicted as dribbly messy sort of dinosaur, nothing like a ‘normal’ dinosaur or dog for that matter. The illustrations also adds a wacky feature to the book and makes for interesting viewing.

This story isn’t for those who want adventure with ‘spine tingling’ suspense – it is more a for a read of imaginative madcap misadventures.

The book is quite descriptive and allows the reader to follow along within the adventure, for some it might be a bit too silly. Those children who have a wide imagination would enjoy this book this story, you would need to have a wide imagination in parts of it because some of it is hard to believe.

Those children who have passed this stage where such imagination isn’t their style may not like this book.

Therefore, I would recommended this book to younger readers about the age of eight. I did enjoy the story, it was a bit of light reading and a bit of fun.

I gave it a star rating of 8 out of 10.

Elle, 11, North Coast NSW