The Wild Robot (Volume 1)

The Wild Robot is a beautifully written story that blends adventure, nature, friendship, and discovery in a way that feels meaningful for both children and adults. The story follows Roz, a robot who finds herself learning how to survive in the wild while slowly becoming part of the world around her. I especially enjoyed how the book explores ideas of belonging, adaptation, kindness, and what it means to care for others. The chapters are short enough to keep the story moving, while still giving plenty of opportunities to stop and talk about what is happening and what can be learned from it. The combination of humor, emotion, and adventure makes this a wonderful family read. It encourages curiosity about nature while also opening the door to deeper conversations about relationships, differences, responsibility, and finding your place. Overall, The Wild Robot is an engaging and memorable story that feels simple on the surface but carries a surprising amount of heart and meaning.

I've heard a lot about this book. And buzz can either be accurate or not. I'm thankful to report in this case, The Wild Robot was worth the read. This was such a cute little read, and now I'd like to see the movie to see if it's as good as they say! I picked this one up as part of my middle grade market research. Several booksellers said kids were eating this one up and they were flying off the shelves. After pulling it out and setting it on my nightstand, I figured I'd just see how many pages and chapters there were - give the book my standard once-over before I dive into it the next day. Lo and behold, I read the first chapter and then looked up and realized I was 50 pages in. Not only is the story engaging and the setting a fun mismash of nature and technology, but the short, focused chapters kept me turning pages. I think I read the book in three sittings - and honestly may have read it in one if I didn't really need to go to bed like an adult. This would be good for reluctant readers or bedtime stories for your kids. Each chapter is bite-sized and leaves you wanting more. There's a great sense of momentum as you read. And the illustrations are just as quaint as the story itself. I found myself incredibly invested in this little island of animals and delighted by a few twists and turns in the story, too. I am definitely really glad I read this one and now very curious about the second one. I would certainly recommend this one. It's a heartfelt, adventurous, quick and quirky little read. And its themes of understanding, compassion, survival, persistence, forgiveness, the cycle of nature, and service to others could foster some cool conversations with kiddos. This one's done right. Middle grade, so no swearing, no romance, a little bit of nature violence and a little bit of robot violence. I'd feel comfortable giving this to most kids. There are a few deaths as a natural part of the cycle of life, so if you have a kid very sensitive to that, it may be worth reading first to judge for yourself if your kid is ready for this (which should always be the default case anyway). But nothing here was near as traumatic as Charlotte's Web or Old Yellar, so I would consider it pretty mild personally.

Allure Wilson thought The Wild Robot was an awesome book and would recommend it to other kids. She really enjoyed the story of Roz and Brightbill. Allure thought Roz was very sweet to Brightbill and liked seeing how the animals went from being afraid of Roz to eventually loving and accepting her. The ending made Allure emotional because she had become attached to Roz and the other characters throughout the story. Allure also liked the illustrations. Even though they are mostly black and white, she thought their simple style worked well with the story. She also felt that the book had enough chapters and didn't need to be longer. Allure had already seen the movie, but she was still happy that she read the book and enjoyed comparing the two. She especially noticed similarities in the ending. Because some parts of the story can be emotional, Allure personally thinks the book may be better for kids around age 9 and older. She would also like to continue reading the series. Her final opinion was simple: “My book is awesome!” Allure, age 9

I got The Wild Robot a while back because I'm trying to increase the number of chapter books that I am reading aloud to my kids. My kids are currently 8, 6, and 3. We just finished Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire which is a massive book for the age of my kids. I wanted to take a break from the Harry Potter series before we started that one, but my daughter was determined to push forward. I am forcing a break before we move into book 5 though because the subject matter gets more mature and the plot gets more complex. But back to The Wild Robot. I might have an easier time convincing my kids to pick this one as our read-aloud option before bed if I were more familiar with it. So I get the audiobook from the e-library. Kate Atwater does a wonderful job with the narration. She is robotic when Roz speaks without being too over the top. And her voices for the other characters were just enough to distinguish them without making it feel like too much either. I think my kids would enjoy the audiobook version as well, since I have the Kindle version, I will probably just read this aloud to them when convenient. Kate did give me a great jumping-off point to guide my own inflection while reading aloud. The book description tells you about all that I can when it comes to plot. Roz is a robot that wakes up on an island. Some robot pieces were scattered around where she wakes up, and she realizes that she's the only robot who survived. And survival is exactly what Roz needs. I love this concept. That's what most of us humans are doing as well. We're surviving. We have to survive in the basic sense of feeding and clothing ourselves. Of course, our society is more advanced in technology so we have many of our survival needs almost on autopilot. But there's still more we have to survive. We need other humans for survival. We need relationships. And so we have to manage, navigate, and sometimes survive our relationships. And how we survive becomes learned and ingrained. Roz does the same thing. She has to adapt to her environment to survive. She doesn't have basic needs as far as eating or sleeping. She can rest, but many of her instincts are about helping her not to die rather than needing xyz to survive. Either way, she sees that she needs to learn from the animals on the island if she's going to survive. But life should go beyond mere survival. Of course, if we don't have our basic needs met, we can't look beyond that to relationships. But once we have the basics we can move from surviving to thriving. Roz shows us that the most satisfying "survival" we can have is to be helpful to others. We can create better relationships that allow us to both survive and thrive when we're living a life that helps and serves those around us. Roz goes from being viewed as a monster in the eyes of the animals on the island to being family. I'm always on the lookout for books with strong moral values--especially if those can be taught in a way that doesn't cram the message down the reader's throat. The Wild Robot succeeded in that area. When we get to the end of the book, the stakes are raised, and the adventure peaks. Some sensitive readers might find this to be too intense for them, but I think my kids would be just fine. They survived Cedric Diggory's murder as well as Charlotte's self-sacrifice from Charlotte's Web. So I think they will handle The Wild Robot without any issues. I'm not sure if we'll continue the series as I've heard less than stellar opinions about the subsequent books in this series. But for now, The Wild Robot gets 4 Stars. Have you read (or listened to) The Wild Robot? What did you think? Let me know!

I have been reading this to my 5 year old for his 20 mins of homework each night. I got tired of reading a huge stack of books. He LOVES this story and was completely enthralled. Instead of trying to get him to sit still till the timer went off he was asking for another chapter. We flew through this book & have already started the next one in the series! The writer is wonderfully descriptive & included just enough pictures to keep young readers turning the page. Highly recommend.

Let my kiddo 6 pick this as his summer reading book. He’s a strong reader but with many books he reads a page then asks me to read. He LOVES this book and not once asked me to read a single sentence. The story is such a sweet story and he’s completely zoned in. I definitely recommend this book to anyone of any age honestly it’s definitely a lifetime must read.

The Wild Robot is a thoughtful story that kept my child engaged from the very first chapter. The short chapters make it easy to read a little each night, and the mix of adventure, animals, and gentle emotions works beautifully for young readers. I also appreciate that there is a movie adaptation. Reading the book first and then watching the movie made the experience even more fun, my child loved seeing the characters come to life and comparing the two versions. I purchased the hardcover edition, and it’s very well made. It feels sturdy, looks nice, and is definitely the version I would choose if giving this book as a gift.

I loved reading this book out loud to my kiddos, three and six. We definitely watched the movie first. But this was great as we could do some “compare and contrast” between the book and movie. My children stayed engaged and listened well throughout the book which I found impressive. But the story really is just that good! The boys loved the book so much, we’ve also already read the second book! We will be buying the third one soon! These books are too good to simply rent from the library! I’m happy to have them in our collection!

Great story, as are accompanying books including picture book. Now a film. Covers so many layers: adjusting to different worlds, growing up, accepting each other. V positive.

My 12 years old son liked it 👍

Such a lovely set of stories, the kids love them and we love reading The Wild Robot with them. Great story, characters, themes and messages, very well written.

my class and i loved this book. it had a great story line and very descriptive language. thank a lot

Superbe livre.On collectionne.