National Zookeepers Week

National Zoo Keeper Week is observed annually during the third full week of July. This week is dedicated to recognizing and celebrating the dedication and hard work of zookeepers. Here's a list of books both fiction and nonfiction about zookeepers.

Updated June 29, 2025
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The zookeeper's wife
Ackerman, Diane.
Paper Book
The New York Times bestseller now a major motion picture starring Jessica Chastain. A true story in which the keepers of the Warsaw Zoo saved hundreds of people from Nazi hands. Jan and Antonina Zabinski were Polish Christian zookeepers horrified by Nazi racism,...
Father of lions : one man's remarkable quest to save the Mosul Zoo
Callaghan, Louise
Paper Book
Father of Lions is the powerful true story of the evacuation of the Mosul Zoo, featuring Abu Laith the zookeeper, Simba the lion cub, Lula the bear, and countless others, faithfully depicted by acclaimed, award-winning journalist Louise Callaghan in her trade publishing debut. ...
Sweet wild of mine
Kerr, Laurel
Paper Book
Love runs wild at the Sagebrush Flats Zoo... In a bid to revitalize his career, bestselling author Magnus Gray has come to Sagebrush Flats to write about the local zoo's latest rescue-an orphaned baby polar bear. But Magnus dreads the drama of small towns and is bullishly determined to...
Wild on my mind
Kerr, Laurel
Paper Book
Love runs wild at the Sagebrush Flats Zoo, where a motley crew of big-hearted animals helps the most unlikely couples find love. When Katie Underwood discovers a litter of newborn cougar cubs, the last person she expects to come to the rescue is her former crush-and high...
Fierce kingdom : a novel
Phillips, Gin
Paper Book
One of the New York Times Book Review's Best Crime Novels of 2017 "Warning: you'll finish this in one sitting." --TheSkimm   "Expertly made thriller . . . clever and irresistible." --The New York Times An electrifying novel about the primal and...
West with giraffes
Rutledge, Lynda
Paper Book
"Few true friends have I known and two were giraffes . . ."
The elephant of Belfast : a novel
Walsh, S. Kirk
Paper Book
Inspired by true events, this vivid and moving story of a young woman zookeeper and the elephant she's compelled to protect through the German blitz of Belfast during WWll speaks to not only the tragedy of the times, but also to the ongoing sectarian tensions that still exist in Northern Ireland...
The panda of death
Webb, Betty
Paper Book
The next book in A Gunn Zoo Mystery Series finds zookeeper Theodora "Teddy" Bentley taking on dangerous secrets, kooky animals, and new family members California zookeeper Theodora Bentley is now happily married to Sheriff Joe Rejas. The Gunn Zoo is celebrating the arrival of Poonya, an...
The loneliest polar bear : a true story of survival and peril on the edge of a warming world
Williams, Kale
Paper Book
"A moving story of abandonment, love, and survival against the odds."--Dr. Jane Goodall   The heartbreaking and ultimately hopeful story of an abandoned polar bear cub named Nora and the humans working tirelessly to save her and her species, whose uncertain future in the...

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