The Heroic Adventure of Hercules Amsterdam

Rating:
Summary: We are easily carried along with Hercules.
Review: Hercules Amsterdam can be said to have, at best, a very peculiar lifestyle. At worst, he can be said to have a fairly unhappy existence. His problem is quite simple: he is only three inches tall. For Hercules, the world in which you and I live is full of dangers and terrors. There are dogs and cats that might eat him, stairs that he might fall down, and bikes that might flatten him. Even the breakfast table is a dangerous place, since it's full of large, often moving objects.

Hercules is relieved, therefore, when he discovers that there is another world just right for him, because it is built for creatures that are as small as he is. Purely by chance, he finds a city in the walls of the house in which his family lives that was built and is occupied by mice. Soon, Hercules is a much-loved member of the almost utopian mouse society and he thinks that his life will forever be good.

With a sometimes startling imagination, Melissa Glenn Haber has created a world in which creatures of the same size can understand one another and the bizarre is not questioned. At times, our credulity simply cannot stretch as far as it is asked to do. The relationship that exists between two very dissimilar animal species seems to be too unlikely. There is also the involvement of a good, yet at the same time, cruel fairy that complicates the story and solves problems that would otherwise be unsolvable. Nevertheless, on the whole, we are easily carried along with Hercules on his up and down adventures, both behind the walls of the house and in the human world.

Hercules soon discovers that his supposed ideal life is not as perfect as he thought it was. He finds himself simultaneously trying to save his mouse friends and deciding where he belongs in the world --- is he supposed to live behind the walls with the mice, or does he belong in the world of the humans?

--- Reviewed by Marya Jansen-Gruber

Rating:
Summary: All is not as peaceful as it seems in the mouse kingdom
Review: Hercules is a ten-year-old who certainly doesn't live up to his weighty name: he's a human boy no taller than a mouse. His parents threaten to send him to a regular school, so he decides to run away, discovering a city full of mice behind his bedroom wall and falling in love with their friendly ways. All is not as peaceful as it seems in the mouse kingdom: when Hercules discovers a deadly secret, it's up to him to save his mouse friends.

Rating:
Summary: I loved this book
Review: I think this is an echanting book that will interest readers of all ages. Ms. Haber writes with great skill, applying wonderful detail to the many adventures of Hercules. I stayed up for two hours past my bed time to finish reading this. This book is as good as Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix!