Everything seems to be almost normal at Lugenheimer Elementary School. Bob and his partner Clementine continue to be hounded by the school bully, Barfalot, and his brainless bodyguards, Pigburt and Slugburt. Clementine is keeping track of the cycle of evil alien attacks, hoping to predict future attacks. And Bob, who dreads the idea of coming disasters, tries to think of ways to prevent any future extra-terrestrial excitement.
It is also Career Day at the school library. Miss Toenail, the librarian, has invited the students’ parents to come in and talk about their sometimes boring grown-up jobs. For example, Lupi’s mom told some interesting stories about being a firefighter. Marco’s dentist dad, on the other hand, talked to the students about the life saving techniques of flossing and handed out dental floss to each of the students.
Things really get interesting when Angelina’s mom steps up to tell the students about what it is like to work at a toy factory. Every toy has to pass inspection. If a toy is not perfect, it is marked defective and thrown away. After telling the children about a recent batch of oddly defective toys, Angelina’s mom opens up a box marked “REJECT” and begins handing out the defective toy hamsters called Happy Hamsters.
An immediate change takes over all the students as they hurriedly, pushing and shoving, snatch up the Happy Hamster toys. Once they each have a Happy Hamster, they begin staring into the bulging, glowing hamster toy eyes as though mesmerized . . . or hypnotized.
Bob and Clementine look around the Lugenheimer Elementary School library. All their friends, and not-friends, were acting rather strangely. The school's librarian, Miss Toenail, was acting even stranger. This had to be an alien attack of some kind, but where, or who, was the alien? Where was Hot Dog? And why wasn’t Bob and Clementine affected by the Dangerously Dizzy Attack of the Hypno Hamsters?
Hot Dog and Bob, and the Dangerously Dizzy Attack of the Hypno Hamsters by L. Bob Rovetch (Chronicle Books, ISBN-10 0-8118-5602-x) is a riot of fun and twisted humor. The very offbeat nature of having a hot dog from the planet Dogzalot serve as a planetary hero is sure to attract boys who would otherwise not read books in a traditional format.
The illustrations by Dave Whamond are action oriented. They zip, zoom, and leap off of every page, and leave the reader breathless from exhaustion.
