Limpopo the Lion: A Tale of Laziness and Lethargy

by Felicia Law, Lilli Messina (Illustrator)

Limpopo is king of his domain and loves that his family does all his work for him. When his family feels taken for granted and leaves, Limpopo realizes that he should pull his own weight and not always take the lions share.

32 pages, Unknown Binding

Published January 1, 2010

Reviews

[Carrie Gulledge · Rating 1 out of 5]

My six year old son brought this book home as one of his school library book choices for this week, and quite frankly, this is probably one of the worst children's books I've ever read.

Let's start with the initial problem that comes up at the beginning of the story. Limpopo is a male lion, who, for the sake of the story, has been humanized because, you know, children's story. Furthermore, he's a male lion who is lazy and lethargic (which I've never heard used as a derogatory term; this is typically used to describe a medical condition). Limpopo the Lion has THREE wives. Ok, I know, I know... lion's hunt in prides. However, the female lions of the pride are not wives. And young children don't need to compare the relationship between the male lion and his reproductive partners to that between married human partners. Furthermore, since they've humanized the lions in this story, what we are actually looking at is polygamy, which is illegal in the country we live in.

But, whatever. I could have dealt with that; overlooked it, so to speak. I know in the grand scheme of things, it isn't actually a huge deal and it is possible that I overreacted to this fact while reading this book.

However, it just goes totally downhill from there.

The general gist of this story is as follows: Limpopo the Lion is lazy. He makes his wives do everything; all of the childcare, all of the hunting, etc, while he provides any necessary protection as needed (which, isn't this basically how a lion pride works in real life?). One day, his wives are out hunting and overhear a couple of Wildebeests discussing how they pity the wives because Limpopo never lifts a paw to help them with anything. The wives discuss this between themselves and decide that the Wildebeests were right; so they pack up the children and go on an extended vacation, leaving Limpopo to starve. When they eventually return, Limpopo is sickly and emaciated. The wives refuse to give him anything except the worst meat that they bring in when hunting until Limpopo stops being lazy and starts doing what they want him to.

So, basically, what this book teaches is that manipulation should always be your first reaction when someone isn't acting the way that you want them to, as opposed to, oh, I don't know.... communication? This is totally the values I want my impressionable six year old learning.

Who the heck thought this was a good premise for a children's book?!