''An Octopus Followed Me Home'' is a 1997

American American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, pe ...

children's A child ( : children) is a human being between the stages of birth and puberty, or between the developmental period of infancy and puberty. The legal definition of ''child'' generally refers to a minor, otherwise known as a person younger ...

picture book A picture book combines visual and verbal narratives in a book format, most often aimed at young children. With the narrative told primarily through text, they are distinct from comics, which do so primarily through sequential images. The images ...

by American writer and illustrator, Dan Yaccarino. The book has been adapted by Yaccarino into an animated television series called, ''

Willa's Wild Life ''Willa's Wild Life'' is an animated television series based on Dan Yaccarino's book '' An Octopus Followed Me Home.'' The series originally aired on Qubo in the United States (and has been put back on Qubo's schedule from 2019 to 2020), YTV i ...

''. It is directed by Steve Sullivan.

Plot

The book tells of a young girl who takes a

green Green is the color between cyan and yellow on the visible spectrum. It is evoked by light which has a dominant wavelength of roughly 495570 Nanometre, nm. In subtractive color systems, used in painting and color printing, it is created by ...

octopus An octopus ( : octopuses or octopodes, see below for variants) is a soft-bodied, eight- limbed mollusc of the order Octopoda (, ). The order consists of some 300 species and is grouped within the class Cephalopoda with squids, cuttle ...

home. When the girl asks her father if she can keep the octopus in the tub, he tells her about all the other animals he let her keep and all the sacrifices he made. The saddened girl returns the octopus back to the

ocean The ocean (also the sea or the world ocean) is the body of salt water that covers approximately 70.8% of the surface of Earth and contains 97% of Earth's water. An ocean can also refer to any of the large bodies of water into which the wo ...

, but becomes happy again when a

gray Grey (more common in British English) or gray (more common in American English) is an intermediate color between black and white. It is a neutral or achromatic color, meaning literally that it is "without color", because it can be composed o ...

brachiosaurus ''Brachiosaurus'' () is a genus of sauropod dinosaur that lived in North America during the Late Jurassic, about 154to 150million years ago. It was first described by American paleontologist Elmer S. Riggs in 1903 from fossils found in th ...

follows her home.

Characters

* The Girl is the main character of the book. The Girl had an octopus follow her home after school. Before the octopus followed her home, many other animals followed her home. For instance a

giraffe The giraffe is a large African hoofed mammal belonging to the genus ''Giraffa''. It is the tallest living terrestrial animal and the largest ruminant on Earth. Traditionally, giraffes were thought to be one species, ''Giraffa camelopardalis ...

, an

ostrich Ostriches are large flightless birds of the genus ''Struthio'' in the order Struthioniformes, part of the infra-class Palaeognathae, a diverse group of flightless birds also known as ratites that includes the emus, rheas, and kiwis. There are ...

, a million

rabbit Rabbits, also known as bunnies or bunny rabbits, are small mammals in the family Leporidae (which also contains the hares) of the order Lagomorpha (which also contains the pikas). ''Oryctolagus cuniculus'' includes the European rabbit speci ...

s, and other animals followed her home. The Girl's name is never mentioned in the book. The Girl is an inspiration of Willa. * Dad is The girl's father. Dad doesn't like the animals The Girl brings home around the house, but, knowing how much The Girl loves them, he lets her keep them. When The Girl brings the octopus home, Dad becomes tired of sacrificing and tells her to return the octopus to its original home. Dad is an inspiration of Willa's Dad. * The Octopus is the octopus that follows The Girl home. At the beginning of the book, The Girl asked her father if she can keep him in the bathtub. Her father tells The Girl to return The Octopus to the sea. The Octopus becomes sad when he goes back to his real home. * The Crocodile is one of the animals that followed The Girl home. The Crocodile sleeps under Dad's bed, and won't let him sleep at all. The Crocodile is an inspiration of Gus. * The Giraffe is one of the other animals that followed The Girl home. Whenever The Girl goes to school, The Giraffe says good-bye with its head sticking out of the

chimney A chimney is an architectural ventilation structure made of masonry, clay or metal that isolates hot toxic exhaust gases or smoke produced by a boiler, stove, furnace, incinerator, or fireplace from human living areas. Chimneys are typic ...

. The Giraffe is an inspiration of Jenny. * The Bear is a

grizzly bear The grizzly bear (''Ursus arctos horribilis''), also known as the North American brown bear or simply grizzly, is a population or subspecies of the brown bear inhabiting North America. In addition to the mainland grizzly (''Ursus arctos horri ...

that is hibernating in the living room behind the couch. The Bear is an inspiration of Bert. * The Rabbits are a group of thousands of gray, orange, and white

s that multiply every day. The Rabbits are inspirations of the bunnies. * The Brachiosaurus is a gray brachiosaurus that follows The Girl home at the end of the book. * The Ostrich is an

that is seen in the beginning having its head stuck in the opening of the kitchen drain. * The Tiger is a

tiger The tiger (''Panthera tigris'') is the largest living cat species and a member of the genus '' Panthera''. It is most recognisable for its dark vertical stripes on orange fur with a white underside. An apex predator, it primarily preys on u ...

seen in the beginning outside in the lawn while Dad is mowing.

References

1997 children's books American children's books American picture books Comedy books Children's books adapted into television shows English-language books Children's books about families Books about cephalopods Fictional octopuses Children's books about crocodilians Children's books about giraffes Children's books about bears Children's books about rabbits and hares Children's books about dinosaurs Children's books about birds Children's books about tigers {{child-picture-book-stub