The Secret Zoo

“These were ridiculous ideas, and Noah knew it. He was stressed, and the stress was making him think crazy things. Still, if these ideas were so crazy, why did they keep coming back?”

This passage shows the impetus of Noah’s quest and that he is driven to it, although he knows it is “crazy.” This early passage sets up the quest arc and the theme of Learning Judgment With Courage.

“The window blew gentle ripples through his ivory-colored drapes. He shivered. The drapes looked like ghosts.”

Chick uses ghostly imagery to invoke sinister and chilling sensations that mimic the sensory experience of the character who “shivers.”

“Why had Megan been making trips to the zoo without telling the family? And how had a langur got hold of a page from her notebook?”

Noah begins to ask the kinds of questions he needs to ask to fill in his knowledge gaps. Megan already has the knowledge he’s chasing, and he cannot follow her footsteps strictly, so he must experience and learn for himself rather than rely on Megan.