Hōkago no jikanwari

One day in the second term of the elementary school year, an arts and crafts teacher—the narrator of the story—happens to rescue a mouse wearing a white coat from a catfight. Mystified by the mouse’s coat, he takes care of it until it comes to its senses, upon which it runs away. Several days later, however, the mouse returns, and he is even more astonished when it stands on its hind legs and begins to talk. The tiny creature explains that it is the last surviving “school mouse,” and has come to tell its tale.

    From that day on, the school mouse comes to the arts and crafts office after school every Monday and shares what the other school mice saw, heard, and experienced when they still lived there. The First Grade Mouse (school mice are named after the room they live in) once witnessed a case of hiccups that spread from one schoolgirl to the rest of the classroom, and then to every human being in the world. The Music Room Mouse composed a song about five slugs and how terrifying they found the school. The Nurse’s Room Mouse—who was the father of the school mouse telling these tales—loved the story Puss in Boots. Finally, just before the teacher is transferred to another school at the end of the school year in March, the school mouse shares its own story as the Arts and Crafts Office Mouse. Each tale is unique and enjoyable to read, with barbed observations about social norms and school life.

    With illustrations by the author, also a former arts and crafts teacher, this fantasy playfully reimagines school, an everyday environment for children, as a place filled with mysterious goings-on. (SJ)