The Tale of Despereaux By Kate DiCamillo -- Guest Book Review

Lynzie and I are having a blast in England. She helped me out a little before we left by writing up this guest book review to share with you all. Lynzie blogs at Thoughts From a Young Writer.

This book has enchanted me since the day I read it. I checked it out from the library, curious about what it would be like. I then fell in love with it, and recently read it for the fourth time!

The story is about a little mouse named Despereaux Tilling, the youngest of the Tilling family. He was not very smart, and looked funny with his large ears. He comes upon a story, one day, about a young princess, and soon decides that he will be a hero too! He meets a real princess above the castle named Pea and falls in love. But to his horror, the first and most followed rule was broken: no mouse must appear before a human. Despereaux is then sent to the rat-infested dungeon, where he fights off rats and darkness to save the Princess from the evil rat, Roscoro.

A young girl named Miggery Sow also appears in the story. She is a young maid who desperately wants to become a princess, after sighting Pea years before. She teams up with Roscoro and kidnaps the lovely Pea, forcing her to teach Miggery how to be a princess.

This story is full of light, rats, perfidy, soup, and quests. My favorite part is when Despereaux meets the princess and calls the King’s music, “heaven”, and “honey”.

I also have a few favorite quotes, such as this one in chapter three:

“Despereaux looked down at the book, and something remarkable happened. The marks on the pages, the “squiggles” as Merlot referred to them, arranged themselves into words, and the words, and the words spelled out a delicious and wonderful phrase: Once upon a time.”

“Reader, you may ask this question; in fact you must ask this question: Is it ridiculous for a very small, sickly, big-eared mouse to fall in love with a beautiful human princess named Pea?

The answer is…yes. Of course, it’s ridiculous. Love is ridiculous.

But love is ridiculous.

But love is wonderful. And powerful.”

Also, chapter forty-five: 

“Cook turned away from him. She put the candle down, and picked up her spoon and started to stir. “Oh,” she said, “these are dark days.” He shook her head. “And I’m kidding myself. There ain’t no point in making soup unless others eat it. Soup needs another mouth to taste it, another heart to be warmed by it.”

This book is truly amazing and cannot be put down. It would be a great book to go on a wish list.