R. Gregory Christie

I enjoyed reading this book because of the illustrations and the characters. This is a picture book with many different colors in it. They almost look like water colors or pastels. The pictures of the mice in the story are not very detailed but they look textured and different from one another. The country mouse wears blue while the city mouse wears red. It is easy to tell them apart because the illustrator used different colors and features in each. The characters were also very fun and down to earth. The city mouse loves his home and the country mouse loves his; but they both venture off into each other's worlds. The characters are very stable and true to themselves. I liked reading this book because of the honest characters and the message they convey. In this fable, the two mice show that living in their own ways that feel safe to them is better than living in fear of wanting different. It shows the readers that their home is different than others, but you can always go back to your safe place.… (mere)

I have a conflicted opinion of this book. I do not like the way this book was written, but I really like the illustrations. Some of the transitions of the story do not make as much sense, and I would turn back the pages to reread it sometimes to understand fully what had happened. When City Mouse decides that he needs a vacation, the next page suddenly shows him in the country visiting his cousin, Country Mouse, but there was no mention of where he planned to go or who he was planning to see. This happens on the next page as well. City Mouse asks Country Mouse what he likes to do for fun, then suddenly on the next page, they are in a forest. Most of the story makes sense and follows a simple storyline, but some of the transitions from scene to scene could have been written more clearly. The book has fantastic illustrations. The colors are vibrant and the characters are defined. There is a lot of detail put into the faces of the mice to the point that the reader can visibly tell when City Mouse is sad and wants to return home without having to read the text.
The moral of the story is to appreciate what you have and to not always wish for what you don't have.… (mere)

Author/illustrator R. Gregory Christie offers a contemporary retelling of the classic Aesop fable of The Town Mouse and the Country Mouse in this picture-book. Fed up with life in Mousetropolis, City Mouse visits his country cousin, but although there is much to enjoy, he doesn't like the food, and finds the local predators unnerving. Country Mouse has much the same experience in the city...

Awarded a Caldecott Honor earlier this year (2017) for Freedom in Congo Square, R. Gregory Christie is a talented illustrator, and I enjoyed his artwork in Mousetropolis. His color scheme is appealing, and his mouse characters cute. The story itself isn't so different from the traditional version of the fable, save that the illustrations depict a modern city, and offer a contrast between the country predator (an owl), and the city one (a cat). I appreciated some of the humor in the text, as when City Mouse feels he is being watched, and the narrative confirms, "And he was." Recommended to anyone looking for more recent Aesop retellings.… (mere)