Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH

Children's book time! I was reading and watching some pretty heavy stuff lately- Schindler's List, The Hiding Place, Valkyrie (which really wasn't as bad as I'd heard)- that I decided I wasn't allowed to read any more books or watch any more movies about World War II and the Holocaust until I read one children's book and finished my current novel (The Portrait of a Lady by Henry James, which honestly, sometimes I have a hard time picking up- once I'm reading the book, I'm into it...it's just getting to that point first).

Enter Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH, a Newberry Award winner. If you're wondering why the title sounds vaguely familiar, you may be thinking of the movie The Secret of NIMH, which came out way back in 1982. Several months back, I saw the movie in the five dollar bin at Wal-Mart. I had to have it- not because it's necessarily a great movie or anything, but it was nostalgic. Who wouldn't pay five dollars for a piece of nostalgia?

Anyway, the movie is loosely based on the book, and I know you've heard me say this before, but the book is way better than the movie. The book tells the story of Mrs. Frisby, a widowed field mouse, and her four children. At the beginning of the book, the Frisby family is living in their winter home, a half-buried cinder block in the Fitzgibbons' garden and are looking forward to moving back to the forest for the summer with all the other field mice. We soon discover her son Timothy is very ill, and will not be able to survive "moving day" back to the forest. Mrs. Frisby goes in search of answers and help, first to Mr. Ages, then to the great owl, and eventually to the rats living in the rosebush by the Fitzgibbons' farmhouse. What she learns while speaking with the rats is more than she would have thought possible.

I won't go into more detail because it would give the whole of the story away. Just know that if you watch The Secret of NIMH, you might want to check out the book from your local library. Trust me, it's a much better story.