“Inspired by an actu­al event, this saga makes for wild­ly enter­tain­ing read­ing. Sun­ny Boy is a self-described placid per­son­al­i­ty who longs … for the qui­et life. Fate unkind­ly snatch­es the young tor­toise from his peace­able king­dom for the nefar­i­ous pur­pose of send­ing him … bound for the soup pots of New York City’s finest restau­rants! A fun­ny thing hap­pens, though, on the way to his demise, when he is eject­ed from his car­ry­ing box onto the table of an unsus­pect­ing din­er at a side­walk café. Thus begins the ter­rap­in’s long asso­ci­a­tion with the male line of the gen­tle­man’s fam­i­ly. Because of Sun­ny Boy’s great longevi­ty, he lives with his sav­ior for a time and then is passed down to three gen­er­a­tions of nephews, final­ly land­ing with Biff the brave. Unlike his pre­de­ces­sors, Biff is an adven­tur­er and a dare­dev­il. With extreme trep­i­da­tion, the tor­toise becomes involved with the fel­low’s per­ilous pur­suits, end­ing with a stunt involv­ing a bar­rel and Nia­gara Falls. All’s well that ends well as Sun­ny Boy dis­cov­ers the fas­ci­na­tion of an occa­sion­al walk on the wild side when bal­anced with calmer pas­times. This rol­lick­ing romp rep­re­sents a won­der­ful mar­riage of text and illus­tra­tion. The com­i­cal car­toon nar­ra­tive, some­what rem­i­nis­cent of Quentin Blake’s work, enhances the tex­tu­al flow of the sto­ry. Not to be missed is the author’s fas­ci­nat­ing his­tor­i­cal note describ­ing the basis for this some­what tall tale. Wacky and sure to elic­it a gig­gle, this one is a win­ner.” (Ros­alyn Pieri­ni, School Library Jour­nal)