When Tanzy, an African elephant, mysteriously disappears after her herd escapes its private sanctuary and causes chaos at a local football game, her owners suspect foul play. But the local police don’t buy it, so junior detective Teddy Fitzroy is recruited to find her. He soon discovers that Tanzy may be in grave danger.
Then Teddy’s best friend, Xavier, is falsely accused of committing vandalism to protest the destruction of his favorite reptile-catching spot. Now Teddy has double trouble. Xavier desperately needs his help. But so does Tanzy.
Can Teddy crack both cases before it’s too late?
The stakes are higher than ever in this latest adventure. In the past eight FunJungle books, there has been a central mystery and a mini mystery on the side. But in this book, we get three mysteries! A mini mystery in the beginning and two more equally critical mysteries. I don’t know how Stuart Gibbs did it, but he managed to twist all three mysteries together without it getting confusing.
Similar to Book 6, “Tyrannosaurus Wrecks,” the mysteries occur outside of FunJungle at many of the ranches around the county.
It should be noted that this is the first time Teddy is getting paid to solve a mystery. It’s about time.
A bit of a spoiler: the topic of exotic animal hunting plays a big part in the story. I do not understand the concept of hunting for sport. Hunting an animal for food I can understand because it has a purpose. But what is enjoyable about killing an animal for the sake of killing it? Then again, some people also enjoy sky-diving and bungee jumping. Humans have weird hobbies.
The movie deal Teddy and Summer were offered in the last book, “Whale Done,” got a small mention. I hope more about this will be brought up in upcoming books. Maybe they’ll all be heading back to LA to help with the movie, and Teddy will have a mystery on set to solve.
I checked the Upcoming Releases list on Stuart Gibbs’s website, and the tenth FunJungle book is set to release in Spring 2026.