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We are reading Stuart Little at our own pace throughout the month of June. Here is where your comments, research, ideas, etc should go so we can all chat about it!

Looking forward to reading it.

I've done a terrible job commenting in here, but this book just did NOT hold my interest very well. I'm sure a lot of it has to do with everything else going on in my life and the 'real world' but...good grief! I wanted so badly to love this and instead I felt very meh about the entire experience.

I thought it was ok, nothing startling. Maybe it is my age but I found the idea of a family having a mouse for a son just a step too far.
Do I think it is still relevent in today's world - probably not. I am not sure that children today would relate to it.

probably not, to be honest. Alayna, who is just shy of 10 now, was very concerned. How did she have a mouse? why would you send your child down the bathtub or into the moving bits of the piano? The part she wasn't worried about was him being in love with a bird. I am right there with her

Elizabeth wrote: "probably not, to be honest. Alayna, who is just shy of 10 now, was very concerned. How did she have a mouse? why would you send your child down the bathtub or into the moving bits of the piano? The..."

I can relate to all of Alyna's concerns. It was just weird and even though it was supposed to be magical realism, it was too far fetched.

Hi everyone, I've been neglecting to get on here for several days and I'm finally here. I know this is a short book, but I was already in the middle of several books, so I just decided to read one or two chapters a day and add it to the mix of all the other books that I'm reading. I finished chapter 8 this morning which is the chapter where Margalo is introduced (and saved from Snowball).
I have listened to this before on audio, but it's been several years. I think I've even listened to a sequel or two.
I concur with the stuff y'all are saying. The book is trying to ride a line between fantasy and realism and can't seem to decide which side to fall on. On the one hand, you have a mouse who talks and wears clothes and tries to do human things, even though he acknowledges that he is a mouse. But on the other hand, there is a "mouse hole" in the house, so it is acknowledged that at some point another mouse lived in the house as a rodent in the wall and not as a child of the family. They don't even say that he is a pet. He has full family privileges. The family also has a cat. Why doesn't the cat have full family privileges? Why isn't he treated as a child they way that Stuart is?
The thing I always questioned is how did Stuart come to be a part of the family. They never use the word adoption. We know that Mrs. Little certainly couldn't have given birth to Stuart, but it is written in such a way that the reader is led to believe that the second son arrived in the same way that the first one did, and the reader should not discriminate.

I agree that this book always felt a bit off because of the border between fantasy and reality. I try to get into the fantasy part and I always liked miniatures and books about little people. The Borrowers and The Littles were my favorite books as a child. I think aspect of the minatures they had to resource and invent reminded me of a doll house and also how they could live in small spaces was kind of cozy. There are many books written in the 40's and prior that are strange. Childrens literature to entertain was a new concept and writers were trying to figure it out. In the 19th century books and early 20th books seemed to have had have a moral lesson or educate in some way. I do admire writers that tried to break out of that mold even though the results may be awkward.

Elizabeth - the movie has them adopting Stuart but the book certainly does make it seem as if she birthed him. Maybe Snowball doesn't speak and that's why?
Annie - the fantastical/magical realism element was/is a big part of so many children's books but this one fell off somehow. I did LOVE The Borrowers as well. Children's stories in the 18th century were more morality stories and prior to that they were fairy tales, myths, and Bible stories but I feel like we're still finding that sweet spot because children change as the world changes...even though adults don't seem to be that different.