Ralph S. Mouse

Beverly Cleary has endeared herself to readers through her cast of human characters. However, Cleary also includes animals in all her novels. Whether it be Henry Huggins’s beloved Ribsy, Ramona’s prickly feline Pick-picky, Leigh Botts’s Bandit, or the Bricker family’s Socks, Cleary fills her novels with interesting animals, creating opportunities for adventure, humor, and heart-warming moments within the larger narrative.

Cleary is drawing on a long tradition in children’s literature. Many children’s books use animals as characters because of their relatability. Like children, animals experience the world differently. Animals are also used in storytelling to teach children empathy and respect for other living creatures. Finally, incorporating animals into stories can add humor or heartache as humans form attachments to them. Cleary uses animal characters for all these reasons and more. However, in her ambitious Ralph trilogy, Cleary attempts to do something unique with her animal character, something she’d never tried and never attempted again. The trilogy’s protagonist is a mouse who can speak and powers a toy motorcycle by making sounds. By blending her signature realist tone with elements of magic, Cleary plays with the low fantasy