For the Love of Animals

Despite a shelf filled with close to 100 YA novels I have yet to read, in one of my recent trips to the bookstore I picked up Kenneth Oppel’s Half Brother (Harper Collins). Set in Canada in the 1970s, the story revolves around a thirteen-year-old named Ben who becomes the big brother to a chimp named Zan. Ben’s father is a famous behavioral scientist and wants to see if a chimp can learn human language. So, Ben’s mother takes baby Zan from his mother (this is heart-wrenching) and brings him home to begin their research. When the funding for Project Zan is pulled, Ben’s father sells Zan to a university in the Southwest United States to prevent the chimp from winding up being used in medical testing. However, this new arrangement quickly seems not as promised: the director uses chains and leashes to move the chimps; a cattle prod scares the chimps into submission; and Zan winds up with a missing tooth.

On a trip to visit, Ben and his mother find out that Zan is being sold (along with several other chimps) to a medical testing facility—one with a horrible reputation. Rather than let this happen, they steal Zan and take him back to Canada. Yet, realistically, what can they do with a growing chimp who was raised to think he was part human? This is the question that they ultimately must answer. It is also the question at the heart of the novel. Even if their research wasn’t “harmful” and was only meant to help us communicate with chimps, harm was inevitable. [As an educational researcher, this question of harm is something I must always consider.]

I really liked the novel. While at times I felt the voice, dialogue, and thoughts did not match a thirteen-year-old male, I would need to get feedback from a male teenage reader to ultimately decide.



Like Ginny Rorby’s Hurt Go Happy, this novel asks readers to think about why and how we use animals for testing—whether that testing is to create shampoo or cure cancer. After reading either or both of these novels, teachers could have students complete research projects that center on issues of animal rights.Students could learn about how to be a compassionate consumer and how animals are used in labs and for experimentation (warning: some videos are disturbing).

The Humane Society of the US has a wealth of information on chimpanzees and other animals used in research.