Skip to Content
The Tale of Desperaux
Kate DiCamillo
Candlewick Press
Fiction, CH Fantasy
Themes: Anthropomorphism, Fables, Small Animals
****
Description
Sole survivor of his mother's last litter, the mouse Despereaux came into the world under a cloud of superstition. For one thing, he was born with his eyes open, and for another his ears were far too large for a proper castle mouse. As he grew, he developed a strange fascination with books and, to his family's shame, repeatedly failed to behave as he ought to: terrified and scurrying. Then Despereaux, head full of chivalrous ideas and unmouselike bravery, meets the beautiful human princess of the castle, and quite foolishly loses his heart as he is caught up in a tale of grief and longing and love... and soup.
Review
I was unimpressed with DiCamillo's The Tiger Rising (liked the writing style, wanted more story), but I saw the preview for the upcoming Despereaux movie
and thought it looked good, so I figured I should read the book first. First off, just judging by the previews, a fair bit has been changed for the movie. That said, I
enjoyed this book. DiCamillo's almost lyrical writing style supports a nice story here, with more depth than one might think at first. Despereaux's tale, painted in shades
of bright light and brooding shadow, touches on many emotions, with an overall air of determination in the face of global disapproval. Some of the characters were
disturbingly dense, but then several young adult fantasies (and full-grown adult fantasies as well) would be much shorter if everyone had a full complement of marbles in
their skulls through the entire book. The author interruptions in the narrative got old; it was a good enough story that she didn't need to keep interrupting it to explain
itself. Either she should trust her audience to follow her through the dark bits or not write them at all. Other than that, it's a good book.
And, no, I still haven't gotten around to watching the movie.