The Adventures of Armadillo Baby and Anbelli — Robert Zamenhof

The Adventures of Armadillo Baby and Annabelli is a charming and whimsical collection of animal stories about the adventures of a pair of brother and sister armadillos. The dominant character in these stories is a horribly powerful and very large protagonist named Raina Sparkle, chimera of dragon, bat, and dinosaur, loving toward the armadillos, but frightfully intimidating and scary to any human or animal who dares to try and harm them! The armadillos are friends with some local animals, like Seflagori, the camel, and Noseberry, the anteater, but learn the hard way that they must be wary of certain other animals, like Elvis and Montmorency, the two Syrian crocodiles, Horatio the Hawk, and Rexi the leader of the angry water reeds. Certain humans should also be avoided, like Captain Shutemup and his communications officer Sparky Blaberon, both from The Happy Gun cruise ship. The armadillos love to eat and the menus for some of their meals are described in detail with reasonable cultural accuracy. The armadillos also love to sleep, and each story ends with the armadillos safely and happily in bed. But the armadillos seem to end up in hot water no matter what innocent activities they participate in, ultimately forcing them to call on the help of Raina Sparkle, their kind protector, who inevitably bails them out of their troubles. Although the armadillos are anthropomorphized, they nevertheless are imbued with amusing armadillian behavioral characteristics, such as walking on the bottoms of ponds, holding their breath underwater for many minutes, curling up into a protective ball when threatened, and jumping straight up when excited or startled. The Adventures of Armadillo Baby and Annabelli will definitely be loved by younger readers and may also bring smiles and chuckles to their adult companions.