King of the Winged Monkeys

Ten-year-old Evan King and his 14-year-old neighbor, Janie, get caught in a terrible summer storm in Kansas. In the clouds, Evan and Janie see something flying. At first Evan and Janie think the flying things are large birds, but it soon becomes clear that the flying things are NOT birds--unbelievably, the animals are winged monkeys. The largest monkey is also wearing a gold skullcap. When the large monkey tries to pick up Janie and carry her off, Evan hits the monkey in the head with a football and knocks off its gold cap. Evan grabs the cap, and he and Janie run into a nearby silo. In the silo, Evan and Janie meet Nee-Nee, a small winged monkey. When Evan returns home, his father and 14-year-old brother Greg don't believe his story about flying monkeys. However, Evan's great aunt Dot believes him and asks him to take her to the place he saw the monkeys. When Evan and Dot go to the silo, they find Nee-Nee still inside. Strangely, the monkey seems to know Dot, and she remembers him--Aunt Dot's full name is Dorothy Gale, and she met the flying monkey long ago in the land of Oz. That night, Nee-Nee follows Evan home. The boy lets the monkey spend the night in his bedroom. The next day, Evan, Greg, and Janie take Nee-Nee to Dot's to try to figure out what they should do. Evan has begun wearing the gold cap he took from the large winged monkey. At Dot's house, Evan gets hungry and wishes for a hamburger. Immediately upon hearing Evan's wish, Nee-Nee dashes out of the house and returns moments later with a hamburger for Evan. Next, Evan wishes he had a pet dog. Nee-Nee immediately flies off and returns shortly with a pet dog for Evan. Unfortunately the dog is someone else's pet, and Evan must to return it. Dot realizes that the gold cap Evan is wearing is the magic wishing cap that had belonged to the Wicked Witch of the West, and that every time a wish is made by someone wearing the cap, the winged monkeys are compelled to fulfill the wish. The next morning, Evan notices that Nee-Nee's wings appear smaller. The monkey's wings used to be so long that he would trip over them, but now Nee-Nee's wings are barely large enough to lift him a few inches off the ground when he tries to fly. Dot thinks that perhaps the magic is fading and that Nee-Nee needs to get back to the land of Oz before his wings disappear altogether and he turns into an ordinary monkey. After brainstorming, Dot, Evan, Greg, and Janie decide that the only way to get Nee-Nee back to Oz is to send him home the way he came to Kansas--in a tornado. When the weather service issues a tornado watch for a nearby county, the group jumps into Aunt Dot's Jeep and drives off in search of a twister. After a few hours, Evan and the others find more than they wanted--terrifying twin tornados spinning out of control along the highway. When Dot tries to avoid one of the twisters, she accidentally places her Jeep in the path of another tornado, and Greg is sucked up into the storm. Nee-Nee tries to save Greg but can't reach him. A few minutes later, the bewildered travelers are astounded when Greg falls out of the sky into the road ahead of them. Battered and bruised but otherwise unharmed, Greg has been given a relatively soft landing by a strong air current that lifted him as he was falling. However, the events of the day have been pointless--the group was unable to return Nee-Nee home. The next day, Nee-Nee's wings are nearly gone. Evan suddenly gets an idea--he will try using the wishing cap to wish Nee-Nee home. Evan wishes that the winged monkeys would return and carry Nee-Nee back to Oz. At first nothing happens. Then suddenly thousands upon thousands of winged monkeys darken the sky and land on Dot's farm. Dot asks if she can go back to Oz with them--she would rather spend her remaining years among old friends in the land of Oz than alone on her farm in Kansas. Evan, Greg, and Janie bid goodbye to Aunt Dot and Nee-Nee. The winged monkeys carefully lift Dot and Nee-Nee into the sky. Evan is sad for himself, but happy for Nee-Nee and Dot.