- a mouse falls in love with a human princess and risks everything to save her
- author tries to paint the picture of “light” being better than “darkness”
- convo: a child’s ears are punched/boxed countless times, all adults verbally mistreat her, and her father sells her the day her mother dies
- convo: hypnotism, deaths of parents, dark dungeon scenes (deaths mentioned, skeletons described, evil rats), cigarettes mentioned
- language: My G*d (but in French) x5, Geez x2, Cripes x10, L*rd x2, Gor x37, some name calling, shut up x3
Type: chapter book
Ages: 8-12
Author: Kate DiCamillo
Illustrator: Timothy Basil Ering
After spending quite a bit of time analyzing my notes and determining what my final opinions on the book were, I could come up with almost no redeeming qualities. The story felt empty and shallow the entire time reading aloud to my children. We never really connected with any of the characters. There was no healthy family unit, and all adults were unlikeable. DiCamillo’s attempt to show light as good and dark as bad fell far short of any effectiveness. There was a lot more dark than light.
Even the message of “forgiveness” didactically described in two different scenes was worldly and self-focused. In the first, the character asking for forgiveness only did it to make himself feel better, not out of consideration of the forgiver. In the second, the person offering forgiveness was only doing it “to save her own heart” and she continued hating the one she forgave. It was just odd.
Another strange factor was that the supposed main character, the mouse Despereaux, wasn’t mentioned for a good chunk of the book. I didn’t go back and count chapters, but it seemed more focused on the girl, Miggery. That could have been because we were sensitive to her abuse but hard to say.
On a more comical note, reader, this short chapter book addresses the reader almost one hundred times. Reader, can you believe that? It even would happen multiple times in one paragraph, reader!
(I realize that can be quite entertaining to certain little listeners, but it distracted us so much we had to begin tallying the occurrences, heh.)
On a positive note, the theme of stories being light was a neat little angle that should have been expanded on. It was a fairy tale that gave Despereaux courage and stories which gave characters’ lives meaning. Alas, however, it wasn’t expanded on and all of the above points reigned more strongly. I’d find a different book for your children.