ajonas17 's review for:

The Tale of Despereaux by Kate DiCamillo

4.0

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To say Despereaux was the runt of the litter would have been an understatement. A small mouse, born with big ears and eyes wide open, was a mystery and scare to the mice that lived in the castle. Further worry came when Despereaux began to go against mouse ways and began to read in the library, walk of two feet and fall in love with Princess Pea. This abandonment of mouse ways leads to Despereaux's banishment to the dungeon with the dreaded rats, and it appears inevitable that he will certainly die. But, when a plan to hurt the princess falls on his extra large ears, Despereaux takes after the knights in his favorite book and decides to take it upon himself to save the princess! I liked the story of Despereaux because it's a cute story of bravery from a seemingly not brave character, or a character that wouldn't be expected to be brave. The one thing I really didn't like about the book is that so much of it happens and the resolution of the book is very brief and the ending is super unsatisfying. In a classroom, I think this is a perfect book to use when talking about characterization, 1. There are lots of different characters to analyze, and 2. Lots of the characters change throughout the book so there is character development to be discussed. It is also a perfect example of the fantasy genre, I mean come on, a mouse who wants to be a knight? Cute, but not realistic.