The Tale of Despereaux

The Tale of Despereaux by Kate DiCamillo was quite a lovely tale. It's the story of a runt of a mouse who lives in a castle and falls in love with the Princess Pea. He is shunned by his family for speaking humans, a King and a Princess nonetheless, and sent off to the dungeon. Upon entering the dungeon he learns of a rat's wishes to harm the princess. A dim-witted and unlucky servant girl with cauliflower ears gets talked into kidnapping the princess in hopes that she can take her place and become a princess herself!

DiCamillo is an eloquent writer. I got the feeling that if she was here reading it out loud to me that her voice would be soothing but that I would hang on every word. She didn't just tell this story, she got to the heart of the issues that caused the characters to be good and bad. For Miggery Sow, the servant girl, we saw that nobody had ever cared what she wanted. For the rat, we see someone trying to get revenge for making him feel so ugly. For Despereaux Tilling, we see what happens when you choose not to conform to what everyone else is doing. The Princess is a ray of light throughout the whole book but we even see her struggle to want to take revenge on those who harmed her, but we also see what good comes when you decide to love instead of hurt.

This story is for younger readers, probably even 3rd to 5th grade, but I enjoyed it immensely. You can find The Tale of Despereaux at a theater near you in 2008.