MIGHTY MIZZLING MOUSE AND THE RED CABBAGE HOUSE

by Friso Henstra ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 1, 1984

Somewhat more clever than the headlong, hoary chase of Mighty Mizzling Mouse (1983)--but, in the last analysis, reduced to a single sight gag. The book's inspiration is the red cabbage house: the mouse, wielding a lumberman's axe, cuts down a towering red cabbage plant (taking to his heels, forest-like, as it falls); he hires a saw-toting frog to cross-section the cabbage head into a stack of cabbage boards; and with those mottled boards he builds a mottled house. (Raised on a central platform, it sort-of-matches the red cabbage plants around.) The house, we see, is for a lady mouse; but it has also caught the attention of a huge (in this scale), hungry rabbit--who quickly nibbles it to bits. The two mice rage and weep; the lady mouse beans MM with his flower bouquet. And then, as she watches, he goes off with his axe to take the measure of a mighty forest tree. Once seen, it's soon exhausted--and some may balk at the ritualized courtship on which it turns. But Henstra's visual imagery gives the individual scenes drama and pith.

Pub Date: May 1, 1984

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Little, Brown

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 1984

Categories: CHILDREN'S