My Father’s Dragon

My Father’s Dragon is a children’s novel about a young boy, Elmer Elevator, who runs away to Wild Island to rescue a baby dragon. The narrative mode is unusual, in that the narrator refers to the protagonist only as my father, giving the impression that this is a true story that happened long ago. The novel was made into an anime film titled, Elmer’s Adventure: My Father’s Dragon, alongside a new animated film to be released in 2021 on Netflix. Excerpt: One cold rainy day when my father was a little boy, he met an old alley cat on his street. The cat was very drippy and uncomfortable so my father said, Wouldn’t you like to come home with me? This surprised the cat–she had never before met anyone who cared about old alley cats–but she said, I’d be very much obliged if I could sit by a warm furnace, and perhaps have a saucer of milk.