Rats [Library Binding]

Pat Hutchins (Author), Laurence Hutchins (Illustrator)

Book Description

Age Level: 7 and up

Sam's insistence on getting a pet rat eventually changes his family's entire daily routine and brings an exciting surprise.

Editorial Reviews

From School Library Journal

Grade 2-4-- Sam wants a pet rat so badly that he buys one without his parents' permission. After a week of continual badgering, he persuades them to allow him to bring Nibbles home from the pet store. This simple, straightforward story has little action, although unusual nighttime noises provide a somewhat humorous encounter with the police. Hutchins' purpose is unclear. Most of the plot centers on Sam's nagging and Nibbles' rapid weight gain; Nibbles turns out to be pregnant, and soon Sam has nine more rats. There is a great deal of discussion about Sam's learning difficulties, which diminish as his interest in rats intensifies, and these problems do not provide a dominant theme or offer any solutions. The jacket illustration hints at more action and mystery than is delivered. Those looking for beginning chapter books will do better with duplicate copies of Giff's "The Kids of Polk Street School" (Delacorte). --Jeanette Larson, Mesquite Public Library, TX
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 7 and up
  
• Library Binding: 96 pages
• Publisher: Greenwillow; 1st edition (September 1989)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0688077765
• ISBN-13: 978-0688077761
• Product Dimensions: 8.7 x 6.3 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,109,648 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3.0 out of 5 stars Accurate, but not necessarily a good read for pet rat lovers, February 22, 2007

By 

Cindy Go "Cindy" (Lafayette, CO USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Rats (Library Binding)

"Rats" by Pat Hutchins, carries the reader nicely through the ups and downs of learning how to care for pet rats, especially highlighting the surprise of taking home a pet rat thinking it is a male and one day waking up to the "peeps" of tiny pink baby rats in the cage. The story is enjoyable and the rat behaviors are accurately depicted, but if you are a pet rat enthusiast, the ending is particularly distasteful.

In addition, if the book is intended to show how a child's learning difficulties can improve by caring for animals, the indication that this child is moving from learning to care for pet rats, a prey animal, to snakes, a predator, is not a very healthy transition.