Lionboy

By: Zizou Corder

Narrated by: Simon Jones

Length: 8 hrs and 22 mins

Publisher's summary

What do you do when you come home one day and discover that your parents have been kidnapped? Well, if you're a brave young guy named Charlie Ashanti, you go off in search of them. And since you happen to know how to speak Cat, your feline friends (the stray cats of the city and the caged lions on a magnificent, astounding floating circus) rally around you, bringing help, advice, and occasional special deliveries. Little do you know that in this search of yours, the fate of the world is at stake.

Sink your claws into this spellbinding tale of Lionboy. Meet a cast of characters you'll never quite forget: the good, the rotten, the ambiguous, and the delightfully weird. Follow Charlie through amazing places you just may have dreamed about as he braves great dangers and experiences the remarkable. Join the adventure!

Zizou Corder is the pen name for a mother-daughter team of authors. Louisa Young is an adult and has written five adult books and many newspaper and magazine articles; Isabel Adomakoh Young is a kid and has written mostly schoolwork. The original Zizou is Isabel's pet lizard, only he spells it Zizu. They all live together in London. This is their first novel in a trilogy.

Don't miss the second book in this series, Lionboy: The Chase.

©2003 Zizou Corder (P)2003 HighBridge Company

Critic reviews

"Lionboy, an ingenious fantasy-cum-ripping-yarn about young Charlie Ashanti's search for his kidnapped scientist parents, delivers a great dose of circus excitement, complete with glitter, exotica, and animal smells. And if it did only that, it would be well worth the read. But there's more: the potent, evergreen childhood fantasy of speaking animal language." (The New York Times Book Review)

Great story, some caveats

My boys (ages 8 and 6) and I loved this story! However, I can’t recommend it unequivocally because some of the language I didn’t feel comfortable with. “Stupid” is used in excess, and d*** and the Lord’s name in vain were also used 1-2 times each. It could be worse, for sure, but had I known that before starting we would have selected something else, as there are countless novels that align more with the speech we want to encourage in our family.

Awesome

This will always be one of my favorite books. wonderful read for anyone that enjoys cats or adventure.

Great Family Story

The whole family (adult, teen and school aged) enjoyed it a lot. The big complaint is one has to buy all three books to get the whole story. The Lionboy by itself is not a complete story. The ending leaves one wondering if you didn't get the complete download.

Intriguing, But in the End, Unsatsfying

This book chronicles the adventures of a young boy as he seeks to find his missing parents. Written for a younger audience than His Dark Materials or the Bartimaeus Trilogy, Lionboy nevertheless engages the listener with lively characters and a fairly fast-paced plot. Said plot, however, is somewhat simplistic, and this book has a disappointingly unsatisfying ending, leaving the listener fully expecting a sequel which, to the best of my knowledge, doesn't exist. Not high art, and again, not as well-developed or unique as His Dark Materials or Bartimaeus, but a fun listen nonetheless.

Lovely story, lovely narration

The narrator is fantastic which only makes the story better. It's a fun and light story which I can't help but smile while listening to. I listened to it when I was younger and yet I can still enjoy it as an adult!

fun, but not complete: you need 2 more books

This is an oddball, surreal kind of a tale and is fun and original. That said, the "ending" is ludicrous, i.e., not an ending at all. The book stops abruptly, mid-stream, mid-search for the boy's parents, mid-introduction of the lions to the king, mid-chase, mid-everything. This book does not "stand alone," but is rather an arbitrary end to force the reader into buying 2 more books if they want to hear the whole story. The audiobook is not even that long; three times the length would have been nothing new in the realm of audiobooks I usually buy. So, even though the story was fun, as far as it went, I was more than a little annoyed at the sudden end with nothing at all resolved.

Cut me in two, would you?

Would you recommend this book to a friend? Why or why not?

Yes. With a disclaimer that it stops just as the story is built and you need to go ahead and purchase part 2 or don't even start it.

Would you recommend Lionboy to your friends? Why or why not?

Same question?

Did Simon Jones do a good job differentiating all the characters? How?

I appreciate the skill it takes to create characters in audible form and he made it work here.

If this book were a movie would you go see it?

As long as it didn't end where the book did...

Any additional comments?

On to part 2...

nice book

Wonderful book it is awesome and is really informational and I love it. also I love the lion talking part and the end. GG m8 love it.

Great book!

LionBoy is a very good book. It's scary at some points, but then there's humor I've listened to it twice. I'm thinking about getting the second book (LionBoy, The Chase).

Fourth time through

I read this trilogy back in Jr High. Loved every second of it. Wonderfully imaginative, brightly written. Lovely collaboration by mother and daughter. Absolutely wonderful. Cant wait to re read book 2 and 3.