Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH, by Robert C. O'Brien
published 1971 - read 2005

Knocked this out today, a little bit by the pool and mostly on the purple couch after work, sweating slightly because summer is sloughing onto us all. I may have read this as a kid; if so I think it was on the houseboat and there may have been cream soda around. But I didn't remember any of the plot details and the few things I was expecting to happen didn't happen - I guess they were just in the movie.

It's a good read. I kept wanting it to be a little more spectacularly good, but it remains just steadfastedly good. The structure is solid: we begin with a mouse named Mrs. Frisby trying to solve a very easily understood dilemma (her child is very ill, but they need to move house soon). The pursuit of a solution gradually and logically leads her to the mysterious rats that live under a nearby rosebush and which possess super-rodentian intelligence and abilities.

The contrast between the amazing rats and the regular animals isn't as dramatic as it could be, because all the animals already speak English, have elaborate social customs, and wear clothing (in the illustrations). One of the mice is even an apothecary.

At the same time, the powers and technology of the rats are almost too amazing, even after several chapters are given over to their origin flashback. Actually, this flashback kind of grinds the book to a halt, since Mrs. Frisby's problems are put on hold for them. There are some established reasons why she might care so much about the rats and their history, but you still kind of go, "Jeez, Mrs. Frisby sure seems to be willing to drop everything and listen to these rats." I guess what I'm really responding to is that there aren't really all that many plot points for this ~200 page book. Sure, it's for kids, but there could still be more going on.

But this is all kind of minor, or I want to say it's minor because I enjoyed the book. There are a few really brilliant bits that stick out even if things are a bit tidy. Just as an example, I really liked this bit from the old wise owl character:

"I have lived in this tree, in this same hollow," the owl said, "for more years than anyone can remember. But now, when the wind blows hard in winter and rocks the forest, I sit here in the dark, and from deep down in the bole, down near the roots, I hear a new sound. It is the sound of strands of wood creaking in the cold and snapping one by one. The limbs are falling; the tree is old, and it is dying. Yet I cannot bring myself, after so many years, to leave, to find a new home and move into it, perhaps to fight for it. I, too, have grown old. One of these days, one of these years, the tree will fall, and when it does, if I am still alive, I will fall with it."

You could do a lot worse for a book that won't take very long to read; it basically deserves its Newberry medal. I want to give it a medal too, mainly for being a book aimed at grade-school kids that uses the word "hypochondriac" to describe a precocious mouse. Keep 'em running to the dictionary, Rob.

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