Gators in the Soup

Gate is a young alligator who likes his solitude. He has a secret mud pile hidden deep in Sunshine Swamp, warm and shaded, where he fishes and rests and thinks about the world outside the swamp he has never seen. His parents disappeared years ago. He has mostly stopped thinking about why.

Then one afternoon he hears someone calling for help and finds a fellow gator named Fish tangled upside down in a rope trap, with two vultures named Dizzy and Nasty already circling. Gate does not hesitate. What follows is a friendship, a mystery, and an expanding world: a frog named Rrribit who strikes a deal to keep the bugs away, a bold toad named Horn who rides on Gate’s head and sounds like a foghorn in a storm, a frog and toad jumping contest in the Bayou, and a run-in with Komodo Dragons that sends every creature scrambling.

Along the way, the disappearances keep coming up. Fish. Rrribit’s sister. Gate’s own parents. Something is hunting the swamp’s creatures, and the clues are starting to add up.

Gators in the Soup is an adventure story for young readers about friendship, courage, and what it means to help someone without being asked. Gate learns that the world outside his secret spot is bigger, stranger, and better than he imagined, and that having friends who show up for each other matters more than any hidden hiding place.