Rating: 
Summary: If only there were a rating with 10 stars!
Review: Although I have not read this book - I have seen the animated feature film from 1977, which I watched as a 4-5 year old child. I can still vividly remember how dark and bleak this movie was, and how the entire cinema of children were crying hysterically. I was not a particularly "fragile" child, but to think of this movie, even now, I get a horrible tight feeling in my chest and an overwhelming sense of despair. The book may not have been written in this way, but looking at the other reviews I believe it is, so I would strongly caution anyone before offering this book to their children to read.
Rating:
Summary: If only there were a rating with 10 stars!
Review: For this literature lover, The Mouse and Hiis Child is the best children's book and one of the best novels I have ever read.
I first read The Mouse and His Child with my 4 year old son. We devoured it in one weekend, read it again one month later and yet again six months later. The book gets better every time. The story is action-packed with an almost endless array of fantastic characters, including what may be the most compelling villain in all of western literature (for me, only Roger Chillingsworth is comparable). The book is hilarious, frightening, and deeply affirming of the power of perseverance, love, and hope. (Sorry that the reviewers on this page who found the book too depressing weren't able to glean this, although it undeniably has very dark moments.)
The ultimate triumph of the mouse father and child is to me so touching, so representative of our hopes for love and security through the struggle of daily life, that I find myself choking up or crying whenever I read the book's finale to my son. This book is probably not for all 4-year olds, but my son, who loves fully imagined, lengthy books, loved it, and he often pretends to be Manny Rat or asks me to walk with him the way the mouse father and child do. I'm happy to oblige, because the relationship between the father and son as they struggle through hardship, the child matures, and the father ages, is poignant in a way that few family romances in literature can compete with.
Not bad for a book about wind-up toys and forest animals.
Rating:
Summary: A classic restored
Review: I first read this book in my twenties and have enjoyed reading it again in my forties. As a children's librarian, I have been recommending this book for decades. The plot is both intimate (concerning the love of a father and son and the quest to become self-winding) and epic at the same time. Like the best novels, the events and elements of the story are not mere contrivances but deeply intertwined threads that provide motive and propel the story along. This new edition features charming illustrations that both capture the mood of the story and add dimension. A wonderful coupling, and so nice to have this classic available again.
Rating:
Summary: Wonderful for both adults and children
Review: I want to add my own positive review to the others. This book is essentially a quest story. The mouse and his child start their lives in a toy store next to a beautiful toy house. After they are sold and broken, their quest for a home, family, and self-determination begins. Of course, there is the evil rat who wants to smash them to bits, a philosophical turtle who teaches them where to search for their home, and other assorted animals and insects who help them on their way. The mouse and child survive war, rampaging theater critics, and a muskrat searching for the elusive X of life. It is a story about perseverance and hope. In the end, however, it is a story about what makes us happy. A story for the young and young at heart. Highly recommended.
Rating:
Summary: A quest story for the young and old
Review: I want to add my own voice to those praising this book. It is a wonderful story about perseverance, love of family and friends, and a search for the things that make us happy. The story is essentially a quest by a father and his child to find a place to call home, a family, and, most importantly, self-determination. Along the way, they have to overcome Manny Rat who wants to kill them, survive war and hypercritical theater critics, a deal with a snapping turtle, and a help a Muskrat search for the elusive "X" of life. The writing and characterization are topnotch. Yes, there are places in the book where animals die and Hoban does not shy away from these aspects of life. In my view, however, these events only add to the power of the story. At times, very funny and very sad, this is a story for both those who are young and young at heart. Highly recommended.
Rating: 
Summary: Dark but rewarding
Review: It's good to see "The Mouse and His Child" back in print, especially in a beautiful edition like this one, with fine quality paper and superb illustrations by the ever-talented David Small. I would recommend this book for kids in grades 4-5, as it is not for the fainthearted; many animals die or get eaten in the dark first half of the book, which is realistic but might be unsettling for kids if they are unused to reading about these harsh things. The premise of the story is a very original one. A pair of clockwork mice are joined together as one toy, and when they are used up as toys, they get sent to the dump. So begins an odyssey of adventures and perils. These include: slavery to a rat (who will pursue them for much of the book when they escape), bank robbery, war (among shrews), arty theater (an an audience riot), school (run by a psuedoscholarly muskrat), immersion at the botton of a pond for an entire summer, and getting dropped from a great height by a hawk. Along the way they meet a series of comic characters, which helps lighten the mood despite the harrowing nature of their ordeals. The ending of the book is so very empowering and happy that I did enjoy it. The message here is one of persistence and self-confidence in the face of overwhelming odds. With its quirky but genuine power, this one stands out among children's novels, and would be a good read for adults too.
Rating:
Summary: The Mouse and His Child
Review: Mechanical toys can not move by themselves--must less think, feel or dream, yet Hobans' father-son performing team proves much more than wind-up toys. Seeking definition, direction and three-dimensional existence, the mouse child asks his father what they are. The patient father replies that he does not know either, but advises his son to wait and see--hardly a satisfactory answer for an eager youth. Their world at first is limited to a toyshop, with its dollhouse and plush elephant. Stoic advice for two wind-ups who are very close--indeed, they are permamently joined at arms' length, so that they can perform an amusing, circular dance--until they run down. But when they break the Rules of Clockwork, they themselves are broken by careless children and trashed. Yet that is really just beginning of their sylvan and aquatic odyssey, as they launch forth into the callous world outside the protective Christmas Home. Besides, the mouse child has a dream: to find a real home and a family of his own, while his gentle father just wants to protect the son. They will be victimized by various animal riffraff, for they encounter actors, con artists, militia, philosophers and brilliant engineers. Oh yes, there is a ubiquitious human tramp who acts as the Deux ex Machina for the patient pair. This book contains humor, pathos, surprise twists of fate, noble dreams and crushing defeats as the mouse duo labors in slow motion throughout their inexorable fate, but do they hane the right to choose that destiny or must they accept what the world has decreed for them? Are they meant to cower in terror all their lives, to depend on others to keep them activated, or to slave for Manny rat, the king of the dump? How will these long-suffering beings (for they ceased to be mere toys long ago) achieve the dual freedoms of perpetual movement And self-determination? Do toys deserve the right to pursue their own happiness? Not really meant for teens only,
this thoughtful yet amusing book will both charm and entertain children of all ages.
Rating:
Summary: A TALE TO READ WITH CHILDREN
Review: On February 1967, Russel Hoban dedicates this book to three "fathers": the third is a friend "under whose Christmas tree I saw the mouse and his child to dance for the first time". The author worked during three years on this Christmas enchantment. Too much for a children tale. In fact: 1) this book is not only a tale; 2) it is not only for children. The mouse and his child form a unique small toy, they hold each other's hands and the father, whirling on himself, lifts and lowers the child, dancing all through the spring wind length. Their dream is to free themselves from the dependence of the wind and it will lead them through the amusing but never quiet adventures that begin just out of the toy-shop into which they were safe. A story of initiation for the child and of wisdom attainment for the father, made of very small things that always appear awfully great.....a bit like in the best successful stories on children. Here too everything has the dimensions suggested by the little heroes eyes. In this imaginary but never fantastic world, we meet unforgettable characters: the techno-philosopher Musky Mouse, who is to the never-ending search of the value to attribute to the unknown quantity of his last theorem, called "the much in the not much"; the crows Wurza e Furza, invaluable actor-managers of the experimental company "squeak of art", especially famous for the text "The last invisible dog"; the dangerous Manny Rat, a true robber of passed days...and how many others! As we said, this wonderful book is not a book for children, but it is a book to read to children, a book that must be thought and elaborated, enjoyed by a man and a child together, linked like the dancing small toy, so to understand that this is a great love story. We cannot say it is easy. Moreover, Hoban puts as epigraph of the tale the wonderful verse of Auden (drawn from "Leap Before You Look"): "the sense of danger must not disappear....."
Rating:
Summary: One of the books that strongly affected me...
Review: On the surface, this looks like a "cute toy animal story". That is what I thought when I checked it out from the library as a child. It is much, much more than that. I remember the melancholy of the book - a strange melancholy, existentially sad yet hopeful at the same time. The concept of forging a family from the other lost and broken souls around you affected me. The rehabilitation of Manny the Rat affected me. The transformation of the larval dragonfly affected me. This is a deep book. It's not for those looking for a light and happy read - the book addresses some of the darker feelings and sadder parts of life. But it also deals in the transformative power of love - the way the broken can be mended by love.
Despite the sad themes, I loved the book. (Who knows, maybe I was more of a philosopher at age 8 than I am now). I was dismayed some years ago when, thinking about the book and wanting to re-read it, that it was out of print. And even ex-library paperback copies were going for more than I can afford. You can bet I'm getting my own copy now. Even if I never have children of my own to share it with, my life still needs this book in it.
Rating:
Summary: The Mouse and His Child
Review: Rusted and stuck on the bottom of a lake, and you can't get out until you've seen the last visible dog. That is just one thing the father and his son have to over come. They see war, death, happiness, cold, evil, and then finally the son sees the last visible dog. A tin of dog food saved the lives of the tin mice. Father and son thought that they would never leave the doll house in the store, and the elephant, until they were bought, wrapped up in tissue paper, and put under the Christmas tree to dance. It wasn't a bad life, well, they were put up in an attic until Christmas came again, and then they would do the thing that they were meant to do, dance and never get tired. Everything would have been fine except that the son was not happy . He was upset that the elephant and the doll house weren't with him, and where was his sister seal that had also spent time comforting him in the toy store? Finally he couldn't take it, he did what he was never supposed to do, cry. That's all it took for the tabby cat to attack them and destroy the gears that make them do that dance. Garbage day came and when it went, they went with it. Then, by chance, a tramp saved them. This book is a work of beautiful fantasy, weaving in things that many authors would leave out.
The Mouse and His Child involved many quirky characters. There was the evil Manny rat who used wind-up toys for slaves, uncle frog who was future seer and a fortune teller, a company of woodland actors/actresses who changed their name every year. Elephant, who once had a beautiful costume and always has an elegant attitude, sister seal, who balanced a ball on her head and spun, then last but not least comes the best of all, the mouse and his child. Father mouse puts up with what happens, and does his best to keep his son happy, but several times he is on the brink of giving up, that's when his son saves him. The Mouse's son is always happy , ready to try again, and doesn't know what it means to give up, he wants a real family and is ready to do everything to get that.
I thought this book was fabulously done, involving situations that bring you tears, but just as you get ready to cry, something good happens. It is my opinion that if anyone is interested in a classic then they need to read this. The story brings to life all of these wonderful wind-up toys. Even if you don't realize it at first you come to see that there is a moral to this book, in fact there is more than one. This particular book is filled with little things to figure out life, for example, "why times what equals how" and other much-in-little equations. Russell Hoban writes it perfectly, but to top it off, there are illustrations that you wouldn't believe. They prove that this book is more then a story of survival, but of something much more, you need to read it to find out. I'll give you one clue to the meaning of the story, a can of Bonzo dog food.
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