The Tale of Despereaux

Title: The Tale of Despereaux

Author: Kate DiCamillo

Illustrator: Timothy Basil Ering

Genre: Newbery

Awards: 2004 Newbery Medal

Age Group: 6th-8th

The Tale of Despereaux follows a mouse (who has been cast out by his family) on a quest to save a princess. Add in a dark and harrowing dungeon, evil rats, a misguided mouse family, an empathetic and kind princess, illegal soup, and an abused servant girl, and you have a recipe for quite the story. It all begins with Despereaux, a mouse who is basically the odd-one-out from his birth, as he was smaller than all of his other mouse siblings and did not seem to be on the same page as all of the others. He ends up falling in love with Princess Pea, and makes the mistake of speaking to her. When Despereaux's brother finds out, the Mouse Council sentences Despereaux to the dungeon, a fate practically worse than death. The dungeon is home to blood-thirsty rats who live to torture the poor mice that get sent there. The red thread of death is tied around Despereaux's neck and he descends into the dark abyss that is the dungeon. In a miraculous turn of events, he is rescued by the jailer, Gregory, and is put on his meal tray to be taken up to the kitchen. Oh, the benefits of having a good story to tell! Meanwhile, we learn Roscuro's story. He is one of the dungeon rats who happens to have been responsible for the queen's death. Ever since he fell into her soup, soup and spoons have been outlawed in the castle. Roscuro is determined to get Princess Pea back for the hurtful way that she looked at him that day. That is when Miggery "Mig" Sow enters the story. Having been sold as a slave to a man that abuses her, she dreams of being a princess. She gets taken to the castle when it is discovered that she is being kept as a slave. At the castle, she ends up assigned to take Gregory his meals in the dungeon. Roscuro finds out about her dream of being a princess, and figures she is the perfect person to help him carry out his vengeance on Princess Pea. Mig agrees to help Roscuro kidnap the princess after he convinces her that she will become the princess and Pea will become her servant instead. Luckily, Despereaux is listening to their whole plan and decides that he will rescue Princess Pea himself. While Roscuro and Mig are busy capturing the princess, a fiasco occurs in the kitchen leaving Despereaux tail-less and his father and the some of the other mice see him again (he is all covered in oil and flour), thinking he is a ghost. His father begs for his forgiveness. Despereaux is finally able to head to the dungeon, needle and red thread in tow, after making an agreement with the cook. In the end, the princess was saved, Roscuro is freed, and Mig is reunited with her father, who had been a prisoner in the dungeon all along. Despereaux and Princess Pea become good friends and live happily ever after. Whew! 

I do not think that I would use this book in my classroom. The writing was great and the story was engaging, but I do not think it would be age-appropriate for most elementary students. It was fairly dark and gruesome at times, and I couldn't get past the mouse being in love with the princess and wondering how that would play out at the end. That being said, I think a lot of kids who love adventure and fantasy would enjoy reading this book independently.

I would say that this book is best for middle schoolers. The plot is intricately woven together, so this book has to be read somewhat carefully as to not miss out on the connections between different characters and their situations (since this book tells multiple characters' stories). It also has darker themes, such as death, torture, and suffering, so that would be good to keep in mind, as well. 

As for some activities to go along with The Tale of Despereax, I found some excellent ideas here! Here are some of my favorites:

• Character Trait Accordion: Students can create a foldable based on a character in the story to connect traits to actual text evidence.
• Vocabulary Soup: I love this idea! Soup is one of the motifs of the book, and this is a fun way of focusing on the vocabulary in the book. The students will have a pot cut-out, and they can color and glue on some vegetables. On the pot, students will include the definition of a word, an illustration, an example, and a non-example.