The Zoo Inside Me
Age 3+
Picture Storybooks Personal & Social Issues: Self-Awareness & Self-Esteem Personal & Social Issues: Disability & Special Needs
Meet your animal alter-egos in this picture book about dealing with behavioural problems, and recognising the effect they can have on others.
Sometimes we feel brave as a lion or shy like a mouse, and that zoo inside our heads can make us behave differently on the outside.
Feelings can be hard to understand. You can’t see it, but this little boy is part mischievous monkey, part curious llama, and part chameleon, hiding from the world. It feels to him like there’s not enough room for all of those jumbling feelings inside, but the zoo in all of us makes us who we are – reaching out to the world from the part you can’t see. And sometimes, all it takes to make things right is friendship, and to realise that everyone else has a zoo inside them too.
This is a picture book that champions our emotions, feelings and behaviours in a way that makes them feel relatable and easier to understand.
Creators
Ruth Doyle always planned to be a writer, but trained as a nurse and studied social care first in order to gain a better understanding of people of all ages and walks of life. She lives on a micro-farm in Kent with her family and an assortment of animals.
Yessica Baeten has an MA in children’s book illustration from the Cambridge School of Art, graduating in 2019. She has also studied film and television studies at the University of Amsterdam and has a BSc in communication and multimedia design. Yessica is passion about stories, and hers are often humorous, with a sensitive note. She lives in the Netherlands with her partner, new baby, and a very naughty cat called Kerfuffle.
Reviews
The Zoo Inside Me brilliantly captures the swirl of confusing and sometimes unmanageable emotions that are inside us all and especially children… A book to enjoy but also a useful way of discussing complicated emotions
LoveReading4Kids
A great stimulus for group/class discussion… The illustrations throughout are really lovely. Bright, colourful, stylized and full of movement and energy.
Just Imagine
