Whortle's Hope

Deptford Mouselets #2

by Robin Jarvis

Young Whortle the fieldmouse seeks out special magic to help him win the Fennywolde Games. With the help of his friends and the mysterious voles, it might just be possible - but is winning worth the price? This is the second title in 'The Deptford Mouselets' series.

Genres: Fiction, Animals, Fantasy

378 pages, Paperback

First published November 1, 2007

About the author

Robin Jarvis (born May 8, 1963) is a British children's novelist, who writes fantasy novels, often about anthropomorphic rodents and small mammals—especially mice—and Tudor times. A lot of his works are based in London, in and around Deptford and Greenwich where he used to live, or in Whitby.

His first novel—The Dark Portal, featuring the popular Deptford Mice—was the runner up for the Smarties book prize in 1989.

Reviews

[Edward Davies · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was great fun, and not as dark as Jarvis's usual fair.

[Matthew Hodge]

I enjoyed the return to the rural setting of Fennywolde (last visited during Jarvis' The Crystal Prison) and this book actually succeeded in having likeable characters that you were interested in. The main problem is that it just doesn't have an antagonist. Obviously Jarvis was holding off until the introduction of Jupiter in the original Deptford Mice Trilogy, but it leaves you with an "Is that all?" feeling at the end.

I can kind of understand why the Deptford Mouselets series went out of print, but for Jarvis fans, you should track this one down.