Ivan: The Remarkable True Story of the Shopping Mall Gorilla

This animated adaptation of a 2014 picture book by author Katherine Applegate and illustrator G. Brian Karas tells the story of Ivan, beginning with his capture as a cute baby western lowland gorilla in the Congo by poachers with “loud guns and cruel hands.” Sold to owners of the B&I shopping mall in Tacoma, WA, along with a female in 1964, Ivan got his name after shoppers were encouraged to enter a “name the babies” contest (sadly, the girl gorilla, Burma, died after a few months). Dressed in human clothes and given a bed, Ivan's activities included baseball games and riding a motorcycle, until he grew too big and was put into a cage in the mall, where he engaged in channel-surfing, finger-painting, and people-watching in a lonely existence. After nearly 30 years at B&I, the organization PAWS and others banded together to get Ivan out of the shopping center and into a zoo, where he was able to gradually adjust to life with other gorillas. A strange true story—brought to national attention by Applegate, who won a Newbery Medal for her The One and Only Ivan—this is recommended. Aud: K, E, P. (J. Williams-Wood)