The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents

Series: Discworld, Book 28 / Discworld: For Kids, Book 1

By: Terry Pratchett / Narrated By: Stephen Briggs

Length: 6 hrs and 35 mins

First off: Is this not The BEST book cover you’ve ever seen…?!!

Seriously! You take one look at the artwork, and you know, esPECially given that it’s Terry Pratchett’s imagination that we’ll be going into, that you’re in for one heckuva fun, and mildly twisted, time!

The artwork enchants, and the writing sooo does NOT disappoint. Plus, as I’d had to squish in a Professional Development book in for work in last week’s Listens, thus depriving myself most SOREly of my beloved weekly Animals pick, I’m absolutely tickled to death that The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents has animals galore in it. The best kind: The cheeky. The hyper intelligent. The conniving.

The ultimately brave, noble, and unutterably generous of heart!

Picture this: Individuals in pointed hats brew concoction after concoction in vats bubbling and boiling over. They use it, or don’t. The dregs of the bubbling cauldrons wind up in the trash heaps where rats scour them clean. And suddenly? The rats are… different. They feel different. They see the world differently. And what’s this? Why, they can talk amongst themselves… and with a cat… who also talks.

But uhm. The cat, Maurice, has never eaten from the trash heaps. So how…? Oooooooh…. waaaait…. did he perhaps come across a rat with a limp? One who couldn’t run too fast? Well, he’d NEVER eat a rat who talked, but oooooh… waaaait… did that gimpy rat have a … stammer…? Might said lame stuttering rat been trying to saaaaaay something…?

Whoopsie!

But whatever! Maurice is now enlightened, speaks like the most intelligent human being around, but now he won’t eat any more rats! He promises! As a matter of fact, he and the rats are in cahoots. And for the service they provide to villages all across the country, Maurice tells the wavering rats that, not only is it right what they’re all doing, but statues should be put up in their honor. By Maurice, the human Kid, and the rats bilking the townsfolk out of all their money, why, they’re just keeping those humans/”Governments” from doing stuff like waging wars, which EVERYbody knows is how humans love to use their money otherwise.

It’s like this see: Maurice, the Kid (Whoops! Wait! He has a name? It’s Keith?), and the rats sidle into town where the rats swirl and swarm about in a most visible manner, thereby looking like a Plague of Vermin. And the Kid… no wait… Keith… pipes away on his flimsy little recorder and WHAM! The rats follow him out of the village and to their doom.

Cha-Ching! Money, please.

The rats are tired of this, feel bad about taking so much money, and they’re just fed up and wanna settle down. Maurice wants to go on forever cuz there’s no such thing as too much money. And so it goes until they get to the oddest village, an ominous village that stinks of rats, but there’s nary a single rat to be found. Instead they find a sign offering cash money for each rat tail turned in. And Rat Catchers, big, mean, loathsome, Rat Catchers who carry around massive weapons and sport mean snarls and decry rats as bringers of plagues and death.

And so Maurice and his crew are drawn into the mystery and unfolding nightmare that is hidden away behind village doors. The Rat Catchers have a dark secret, and as all is revealed, Maurice and the educated rats must decide just how far they’ll go to save dumb, dull, unenlightened, voiceless rats who are being vilely and viciously treated.

It might sound a taaaad dark, and heck! It’s Terry Pratchett so it’s TOTally dark and rife with social commentary. But it’s so very fun, hilarious, and incredibly sweet. Maurice, who begins the story as a bit of an avaricious git, fights tooth and claw for the lowly, and especially for his friends. And when all is said and done? Hush, don’t tell anyone, but maybe, just maybe, he might sacrifice one of the precious few of his nine lives remaining to see that a beloved buddy might get a second chance.

There is violence, and there is cannibalism, and there are Rat Catchers who miiiiiiight get what’s coming to them. But there’s also a REAL Piper who shows young Keith a thing or two. And there woooould be a Happily Ever After, but this is Pratchett, remember, so that comes with committees and all sorts of haggling and baser human nature.

This is my first Stephen Briggs narration, and I must say that I was absolutely delighted with his performance. It didn’t matter if it was Maurice, or Peaches (The exasperating rat who knows way more than Maurice would like her to), or Rat Catcher One, or Rat Catcher Two, or the Mayor’s daughter—all are given their own distinct voices without too much vocal juggling. And that there’s quite a bit of action only gave Briggs that much more room to shine as a verrrrry talented narrator!

Several books into the Discworld series, first book in the Discworld for Kids, The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents was enchantment galore. Fun characters, paired with awesome and ominous written action, and top notch narration.

What’s not to love?

And yessssss! An Animals Pick of the Week that oh so totally makes up for missing one last time. HUZZAH!!!