The White Giraffe
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| The White Giraffe | |
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 First edition cover |
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| Author(s) | Lauren St. John |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
| Series | African Adventures |
| Genre(s) | Fictional |
| Publisher | Orion Children's Books |
| Publication date | Aug 1, 2006 |
| Pages | 192 |
| ISBN | 1-84255-520-0 |
| Followed by | Dolphin Song |
The White Giraffe is a children's novel by Lauren St. John first published in 2006. It is the first in the African Adventures series.[1]
This book was voted the winner of the 2008 East Sussex Children’s Book Award.[2]
Lauren St. John picked out a giraffe for the story because she always wanted to ride one. When St. John was a child living in Zimbabwe, Africa, she owned several wild animals including a giraffe.
The book was nominated for the 2010 Rebecca Caudill Award. It also was included in the 2009 2010 District 65 Battle Of The Books, an intermediate book award for children in Illinois.[citation needed]
[edit] Summary
Martine is left an orphan after her parents die in a terrible fire; she is shipped off from England to live at an animal reserve in South Africa with her grandmother Gwyn Thomas, whom she has never met before. There she meets Tendai, a local worker on the game reserve with Martine's grandmother. Tendai takes Martine to his aunt named Grace, and she tells Martine that she has "the gift."
When Martine has started to get used to her new home, she hears a local legend about a mythical white giraffe. Although no one sees it, the giraffe is rumored to leave footprints where it visits at night. Gwyn Thomas insists that the white giraffe is nothing more than a creature of legend, even though everyone else believes in it. Martine is startled, one stormy night, to see the white giraffe outside Gwyn's home. After some time, Martine feels courageous enough to start looking for the white giraffe at midnight. When Martine is almost bitten by a deadly cape cobra in her search, the white giraffe, who she calls Jemmy, saves her. A few nights later Martine is with Jemmy in the wildlife reserve and hears two poachers discussing the giraffe. One of them spots her, and Martine, for the first time, rides on Jemmy to get away.
Martine and Jemmy escape to a secret valley, where Jemmy lives during the day, and Martine enters a cave inside. Paintings of ancient tribesmen on the wall depict a girl riding on a white giraffe, which fascinates Martine. Over the course of the next few weeks Martine learns how to ride Jemmy, Then, one night, she decided to go back to Jemmy’s secret valley to look, once again, at the painting. Inside, she meets Grace. Grace is a sangoma, a woman skilled at healing, and she tells Martine the full story about the ancient cave. Grace also gives Martine a bag of vials, which are used for healing. The next morning, Gwyn Thomas tells Martine that the white giraffe has been stolen by poachers. They suspect that Jemmy is on a ship, and race to the docks to try and find him. While searching for Jemmy, Martine meets Ben, a (mostly) silent boy from her class. Over the course of the book Martine has become good friends with Ben after they save each other from their class mates on multiple occasions. She quickly explains to him what happened, and he agrees to help. Ben thinks that Jemmy is held captive in the cargo hold of the ship his father is captain of. They find Jemmy wounded in the cargo hold, and Martine heals him with Grace's medicines. Then they ride off back to the game reserve, where the police capture the poachers. and a happy ending happens
