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Both my parents swear they read this to me, but while I remember every other Bill Peet book in near perfect detail, I had no recollection of either the story or illustrations in this when I tracked it down this year. It blew me away.

Capyboppy is different from all his books not only in the way the illustrations are black and white, but in the whole tone of the story. It is essentially a nonfiction recounting, drawn from his own life, and featuring a pet rather than wild animals. But what a pet!

The story is very much a time-locked one - try imagining a world today where a wild animal bites a child hard enough to make him bleed, and instead of bringing in police and lawyers, it just makes a fun newspaper story. (Of course, it does force them to reevaluate his suitability as a household pet, but I think that's another product of the time in the first place. How many capybaras have you seen in your neighbors' backyards?)

The illustrations completely capture the animal's cuteness (and then some), and the way he describes its sound as a "tweetle-tweet" is charming. The imagery of a pile of cats flying in all directions at the brain-breaking sight of a giant rodent invading their territory is priceless. There's even something about the idea of him "chewing his grass in sullen silence" that I love; I can just picture the expression on its face.

All in all, a brilliant book no matter your age. I love every word in this so much I can't stop reading it. The only drawback is that now I can't stop wishing I could have just one night spent reading on a loveseat with a sleepy capybara curled up next to me.