We Can't All Be Rattlesnakes
-
-
5.0 • 1 Rating
-
-
- $11.99
-
- $11.99
Publisher Description
Crusher the snake will charm readers in this entertaining, funny novel about a snake in captivity and how she turns the tables on her human captor.
I am a snake.
No, not a rattlesnake. I just look like one. I’m a gopher snake.
One day an oily, filthy, fleshy human child crossed my path. As luck would have it, he knew the difference between a gopher snake and a rattlesnake. He has imprisoned me in a terrarium. His name is Gunnar. He calls me Crusher. He thinks I’m male. I’m not.
He dropped in a dead mouse and hoped I’d eat it. I buried it. He then dropped in a live one, which he called “Breakfast.” I didn’t lay a coil on it.
Gunnar thinks I’ll be his adoring pet. He’s wrong.
In fact, I am planning my escape. I may take breakfast with me.
Unlikely Friendship: Crusher is supposed to eat the live mouse dropped in her tank. Instead, she finds herself protecting a tiny, white-furred creature named Breakfast.Sarcastic Narrator: Told from the witty, defiant point of view of Crusher, a gopher snake who has some very strong opinions about her “oily, filthy, fleshy human child” captor.Animal Adventure Story: From outsmarting her captor Gunnar to planning a great escape, this is a hilarious adventure about seeing the world through a very different pair of eyes.Friendship and Empathy: A laugh-out-loud chapter book for kids that explores big ideas about freedom, friendship, and what it means to care for someone you were never supposed to like.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Told by Crusher, a gopher snake, this pointed story might encourage middle-graders to rethink their relationships to any pets that are incarcerated in cages. Briefly mistaken for a rattlesnake, the venomless Crusher is caught by Gunnar, "an oily, filthy, fleshy human child" who displays an outsize insensitivity to his collection of creatures. Gunnar's mother, who never follows through on either threats or promises, and his uninvolved father do not build a strong case for the humans in this tale, although their characterizations explain a lot about Gunnar's expectations of his "pets." Advised by Gunnar's other captive reptiles, Crusher decides that her best chance at freedom lies in pretending to be fully domesticated; the trouble is, she begins to feel sorry for Gunnar. While the interspecies dialogue doesn't reach the heights of James Howe's Bunnicula comedies, the humor here is more acerbic and the focus more squarely on the human interactions. Ages 8 12.
