"Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH" by Robert C. O'Brien

This is an incredibly unique book.

Just the title alone is unlike pretty much anything else out there, and the plot is similarly singular. Or rather, the basic plot and elements are pretty standard, but it's the way the author goes about it that sets it apart.

It's a talking animal book. The animals have animal-scale problems, but they're also sentient. There's humans, but they're not really characters; that's the animals. All pretty standard, right?

And yet, the author rises above the genericness of those elements into something almost completely novel. The animals (specifically |the rats|) actually consider the ethics of stealing from the humans. There's backstory. There are just... a lot of little details that take this book from normal to excellent.

I've read this book twice; the first time was probably about ten years ago, so I decided to reread it for my first completed quest (which this review is part of). It's a testament to the author's writing that even though I knew pretty much exactly how it ended, the tense parts were still tense.

Approximately half the book is in the present, about Mrs. Frisby. Approximately half the book is flashbacks, about the rats of NIMH. Yes, it's about rats; no, it's not weird and disgusting.

Were this a videogame, I'd rate it: E10+ for some scary scenes. All the flashbacks might make it a bit tricky to make into a videogame.

5 stars.

(Endnote: I'm not sure what NIMH actually stands for; I don't think the book ever tells us.)