The Galactic Zookeeper's Guide to Heists and Husbandry

By: A.C. Huntley

Narrated by: Kim Churchill

For eight years, Saffron Savage has been stuck on a dilapidated zoo-planet on the outskirts of the galaxy. Her mountains of overdue student loans make it impossible to afford the cost of leaving, and her sleazy coworkers force her to work demoralizing jobs on a daily basis. Desperate to escape, she hatches a scheme that might just be crazy enough to work: steal the zoo's rare, two-headed llama and sell it to the highest bidder.

When the poorly planned theft lands Saffron and her stolen companion as unwitting stowaways on an outbound ship, she must pose as an animal rights activist on a mission to return the animal to its home planet. To her surprise, the ride comes with some perks–an instant chemistry with Captain Michael Reyes, and burgeoning friendships with the ship's motley, animal-loving crew. Other than the lie that's snowballing out of control, Saffron finds herself settling into this quirky, ship-bound life.

If only the buyer wasn't the most notorious, cut-throat mob boss in the galaxy. Or there wasn't a warrant out for her arrest.

The Galactic Zookeeper's Guide to Heists and Husbandry is a fast-paced space romp about second chances, rediscovering purpose, and finding family in unexpected places.

©2023 Bena House LLC (P)2023 Bena House LLC

sci Fi is better with humor

very good book with a very realistic outlook to the future no need to do a bunch of sci Fi talk and hand waving. just characters that feel real and act like normal people. excellent read and performance by the narrator.

Loved it!

When it comes to audiobooks, I've ventured through realms of storytelling, but I recently stumbled upon an absolute gem, and I was happy to have come across it.
The plot, which revolves around a zookeeper and her two headed llama on the run, keeps your headphones glued in as she makes her way through precarious situations. This books plot is completely unique with a mix of romance, drama, and a tale of redemption.
This audiobook has truly been a delightful find and a fun read/listen.
Hope to see more from this author.

rough start to a funny story.

Author struggles to find a begining to a lovely heist style story with humor and great twists. don't elt the bwgining scare youa way from a fantastic story. wish we had a better reader to listen to with mote than 4 voices for an entire book.

Fun Space Romp

Saffron Savage, red-haired animal excrement-shoveler extraordinaire, lives with her crushed dreams of looking after exotic animals on a backwater world at the ass-end of the galaxy. The zoo owners don’t care for the animals and would rather let them die than pay to take care of them. Only one of three women on the entire planet, her situation is less than desirable.

Seeing a chance to get off that dump and leave her poor life choices behind, Saffron absconds with a rare, highly protected, and equally highly desired animal. A kind of two-headed llama thing called an umemeh. The umemeh is highly sought after because something in its next muscles can be converted into an effective impotence-fixing medicine.

Saffron is her own worst enemy for most of this book. Sure, she is deeply indebted to the galaxy’s most notorious mob boss, who would happily kill her should she fail to deliver. Still, her poor choices and inability to communicate effectively with people are her main issues.

She can therefore be hard to like at times when she’s wallowing in self-pity and recrimination, but she does elicit some sympathy. She is flawed, be she is trying to be better. Parts of this really hit hard, with some fantastic passages where she is deep into her despair, and her inability to trust anyone makes Saffron as a character feel very real.

I always enjoy a ridiculous title, and “The Galactic Zookeeper’s Guide to Heists and Husbandry” certainly caught my attention. The blurb does a pretty good job of describing what you’ll get. I wouldn’t exactly describe it as fast-paced. There’s always something going on, but I think “frenetic” might be a better adjective.

The length of the book took me by surprise. There’s always some disaster or catastrophe going on, and when I thought I must have been drawing close to the end game, I looked at the time remaining, only to find I was halfway through. I hadn’t noticed the runtime was a tick over fourteen hours when I dropped the credit, so this made a lot more sense when I realised that.

The world-building was okay. We get a general understanding of the universe and some of how it functions. Planets or stop-over points with names like the Horse’s Ass or the Hobo’s Towel drop in with no explanation behind their name. The quantum communicators (aka quanta-coms) I liked and how they neatly solved the problems of talking to people many lightyears away.

The narration by Kim Churchill was excellent. No production or quality issues that I noticed, and a good range of voices for all the various characters… even some (well, one) that is particularly annoying… but he’s meant to be an annoying robot, so it suits.

Overall, it’s fun and silly with a sweary, thirsty, rather crass main character on a mission to pull herself out of a terrible situation by swapping one bad choice for another. I doubt I’d rush to give it another listen anytime soon, but I can see myself giving it another go at some point.

Brilliant work

A wonderful story with beautifully developed characters. Saffron Savage is a riot and extremely related. What a joy of a read.