The One and Only Ivan: A Newbery Award Winner

A surprisingly sad book but an easy read. The ending makes it worth it. The writing is poetic, so might be best for middle school kids.

I am a 3rd Grade teacher and we used this book for a book study. It is an amazing book that teaches a lot about perseverance and friendship. I would highly recommend reading it.

My 2nd grader loved this book and is excited about the sequels! Easy and fun read

This book won the Newbery Medal for Children's Literature in 2013, and it was much deserved. Here's what the book has going for it:1. The Targeted age of the reader: In recent years people have complained that the Newbery Medal was being awarded to books that were for an older demographic, like older teenagers. I'm not sure I agree with that, because when you read the earlier Newbery Medal books you can tell by the vocabulary and subject matter that the intent has always been for these books to enrich the young reader regardless of age. With that said, Ivan is a book that has a slightly younger age group in mind. Which is important as it will introduce the young reader to great stories spurring them on to try to read more Newbery Medal books.2. The story is based on a true story. Ivan was real! The main parts of the story are true. This would be a great school book for a young, say 5th grade, class to read, and then research the true story. A simple Google search will turn up all kinds of information about the real Ivan, pictures and all. In turn this information could be used in projects and presentations.3. I love the characters! I truly enjoyed getting to know every character presented in the story. From the animals to the humans, each one has a great personality that I really enjoyed. My two favorite characters were the young girl, Julia and the dog, Bob. The author could easily write more books about Ivan, and Julia and Bob.4. The illustrations are nice, and very contemporary.What I didn't Like:1. The book is separated out, but not into chapters. I wish she had done that.I really felt a "Charlotte's Web" vibe to this book. The plot and characters have some similarities that just made the book overall enjoyable to read.I recently heard that Disney has bought the movie rights to this story, and I hope that's correct. It would make a great movie!

This is book #7 on my Recommended By Friends list! Another one of my favorite people, who doesn’t get to read “grown up” books, wasn’t going to play along when I asked for recs. As a mom and a teacher, I knew she’d still have some solid books for me, even if they are labeled for kids!! With a few ideas to pick from, I remembered this title right off the bat. She’d mentioned it before, and her family even went to ‘meet’ Ivan!! So I knew this was the one.In the beginning, I was all happy learning about Ivan and his friends - Stella, Bob, Julia, even the Macaw named Thelma!! I love that Bob is not a fan of people, but lets Julia close. Ivan sleeps with a stuffed gorilla every night, a gift from Julia, that he named Not-Tag after his sister. And Ivan’s an artist!! Who sometimes eats his crayons!!But then it gets really depressing. A new baby elephant comes. She’s malnourished and seems to have been tortured. Mack is an awful human who doesn’t get Stella the help she needs. Then he continues to torture Ruby by bolting her foot to the floor. I do not like this man!!Ivan paints a billboard size picture of Ruby in a zoo for Julia to see. Thanks to her & George, it brings a ton of attention, protestors, inspections. Things happen fast after that, and the zoo people come to get the animals to a better place.At the zoo, Ivan is alone. But then he is slowly introduced to a gorilla family, which will be his own. It’s sweet. And then Julia and Bob come to visit!!This is a beautiful story about a real silverback who had a horrible first half of his life. I love the truth to it, as well as the fictional bits to turn it into a chapter book for the kiddos.

This was a great book for my kids to read. They loved it.

it warmed my heart in some places and sparked of emotions and other places it was amazing a recommended book and the shipping speed and quality was amazing too. I recommend it. I loved the book overall.

What a good story! It is a bit sad, but the ending is fabulous! I like that the importance of relationships is a theme woven from beginning to end!