Pool of Tears, a Murine Memoir

It ain’t easy, being a talking mouse. Add to that a bum leg and a couch potato figure, you have Dorothy Mustt, heroine of Angus Brownfield’s novel, Pool of Tears, first book of the Mustt Adventure series.
Talkers, as they call themselves, are the product of a failed genetic research project—failed in the eyes of its author. What she’s created are mice with speech and opposable thumbs, but much more, the ability to reason. They’re so smart, in fact, they adopt a Prime Directive: “Never, ever talk to a Human.” They saved from being euthanized by a human with a weak stomach, but even he doesn’t know they can talk.
What Talkers don’t have is culture, both a curse and a blessing. They look at the world with the innocence of Adam and Eve before the Fall. Dorothy and her kin study humans via the ultra-dysfunctional family whose house they share and through endless hours in front of a TV set that’s always on. Their speech is John Wayne overlaid with Nova.
Dorothy falls in love with a human and can’t handle the emotion. She is Candide with four legs, Cyrano with twitchy whiskers, an overweight Madame Bovary. Her adventures pit her against a mouse tyrant, make her the protégé of a mouse sage, and lead her to break the Prime Directive for love.
A mixture of adventure and satire (plus a little interspecies love), Pool of Tears will leave you wanting more of Dorothy and the Talkers.