In a recent post, I mentioned having taken out a library card in Lake Jackson and checking out some books. One of the books was by a Lake Jackson author I know, Lauri Cruver Cherian. The author of four books, the particular one I was interested in was Four Anxious Armadillos. It’s a middle grade book. Hence I’m not really in the target audience, but my youngest grandson is. I checked it out for him, but I wanted to read it too.

Four Anxious Armadillos is the story of Nilda, a nine-banded Armadillo who is in the Amazon rain forest, but feels she is in the wrong place. She longs to see the grasslands of South America and heads in the direction. But she is anxious. When she encounters uncertainty, she follows her natural instincts, jumps four feet into the air and, instead of landing on her feet, lands on her back and is helpless. before long she is helped by a sloth, who also gives good advice for the journey ahead.

In that journey, Nilda encounters three other armadillos, who join her on her trek. They are of different armadillo species. Each of them has a different inherent trait for dealing with danger or simple anxieties. Each of the four armadillos learns how to use their natural trait in a helpful way.

The book is an easy read for a child of around 8 to 10. The age of interest may be a little longer than that. Since it is based in South America, the book includes many snippets of Spanish. But these are mostly explained in the text; if not, a glossary in the book translates them. I generally did not have to understand the Spanish to understand the text. Also in the book are discussions of the animal species in the story. Each chapter includes a nice illustration.

I finished the main book in two days and the appendices in one more.  My nine-year-old grandson, who is somewhat hyper, read about the first half and put it down. Thinking he was uninterested, I returned it to the library. A couple of days later he said he would have finished it. I hadn’t accounted for his difficulty in concentrating. I hope to take him to the library soon to finish it.

I rate this book 5-stars for those in the target age range.