Chronicles of a Lizard Nobody: The Hat of Great Importance
Patrick Ness, illustrated by Tim Miller
Walker Books

At the start of this second in Ness’s wry series, when Zeke the monitor lizard’s best friend Daniel turns up at the school bus stop wearing a large pink hat, Zeke is deeply disturbed. Surely it’s only birds – the top of the pecking order – that wear hats.

However, things get stranger still with the very tall tower – the Death Ray of Death – so Daniel surmises, is being built exactly where Pelicarnassus and his mum live. Does she intend to melt the school or focus it on Zeke exclusively? Plus Zeke learns that his buddies, Alicia and Daniel are visiting the Guidance Counsellor and have been told to spend their time exclusively with one another. Poor Zeke feels alienated and persuades himself that someone is out to get him.

Then the bus doesn’t turn up the following morning, melted by the Death Ray of Death and replaced by a van driven by a shrew. When the same shrew arrives on a bike after school, saying that the van was melted in his driveway, Zeke is certain it’s not the shrew that’s the real target of the Ray of Death, (rather it’s himself).
With the focus on the dynamics of friendships and themes of mental health and the willingness to share emotions, the author also further explores social inequality especially that between the lizards that live in the poorest part of town and other creatures in the school.

Once again Tim Miller’s illustrations are as droll as the words and are sure to bring plenty of smiles to readers’ faces.