The Capybara Conspiracy

Erica S. Perl's The Capybara Conspiracy is a comedy for 10 year olds about a drama-club girl who ends up accused of doing away with her school's mascot.

What happens

First thing to know is that it's written as a play. Every line has the speaker's name in front of it, and the stage directions tell you who walks on, who freezes and when the lights go out.

It opens with Olive Henry sitting outside the principal's office. She's in seventh grade, she writes plays, and she's just told the new boy Dev that people are saying she killed Cappy.

Cappy is a real capybara (the world's biggest rodent, as Olive points out). He's the mascot of Farley Middle School, where sport is everything. The morning announcements are all about baseball and the pep squad. The drama club has to rehearse in a crowded basement everyone calls the Dungeon.

So when Olive wins a big playwriting prize and the principal calls her Henry Oliver, then hands the school hall to the Ultimate Frisbee club instead, she's had enough. Something radical is needed.

That's when a boy called Pablo offers a plan. Borrow Cappy, return him safely, and get treated as heroes. Olive's best friend Rey is dead against it. He's convinced Cappy is a blood-sucking creature called a chupacabra and he doesn't want to touch him!

It's very funny. Olive talks fast when she's nervous, which is most of the time. Rey steals every scene he's in. There's a girl who founded a pony and capybara rights club when she was eight, and a waving flag who explains the school colours are ketchup red and mustard yellow.

Reading it feels like watching a show from the front row. Olive steps out of the action to talk to Dev and to you, then jumps straight back in.

It's also about something real. What's it like being the kid who's good at things nobody claps for? If your reader would rather be on a stage than a pitch, they'll probably feel very seen.

Worth knowing before you hand it over

This one sits at the top of this shelf. The kids are in seventh grade, there's a crush, and at one point the gang invent a silly cover story about the capybara being smuggled for a made-up drug. It's all played for laughs, but it's middle-school humour through and through.

What to read next

If they're after another girl who dreams of the stage, try Dream, Annie, Dream. Annie is twelve, she's spending the summer at theatre camp, and there are auditions coming up for a real production of the musical Annie.