Hamstersaurus Rex

Gr 3–6—Entering the extended family that includes Timmy Failure, Otis Dooda, and Greg Heffley, Sam Gibbs is a lovable, misunderstood outsider. Sam is down and out because of an ill-fated foray into caricature drawing that turns his classmates against him and leaves him ripe and ready for a magical sidekick. He finds one when the class hamster consumes a bit too much of their gym teacher's bodybuilding powder and transforms into a mutant creature with a voracious appetite and physical characteristics of a small but incredibly strong dinosaur. O'Donnell's comedy bona fides include writing for the TV show Billy on the Street and penning essays for McSweeney's and The New Yorker. As with most successful kid-centric comedy, he gets lots of mileage out of the communication breakdown between kids and adults, which enables Sam to hide his wild, snack food-wolfing pal much longer than he should be able to. O'Donnell's farcical stock characters (nicely complemented by Miller's cartoon-style illustrations), such as the teacher's pet and the secretly sad gym teacher, are another source of amusement. The more major characters, including Sam's disc golf-playing BFF Dylan and swirlie-loving bully, Beefer Vanderkoff, are only modestly fleshed out—not necessarily a bad thing, since O'Donnell is aiming for rapid-fire amusement in the form of briskly deployed gags. O'Donnell misses an opportunity by not giving Hamstersaurus Rex, the character, a voice of his own. That would have made Sam's alone time with the swiftly changing animal more satisfying (and potentially funnier). Still, adults and kids alike will find that O'Donnell's deadpan, mildly absurdist writing style will generate some satisfying laughs.