Sunday, May 07, 2017

"The Adventures Of Little Mouse"



Ridge-area resident Jim Barnes "spent thirty-five years as an elementary school teacher, mentor, and administrator in Palermo"; now the long-time educator is publishing a series of stories for pre-teens to cultivate "the intellectual and moral virtues that have stood the test of time in attaining a meaningful, productive, and satisfying life" (more at littlemousethemouse.com).

The inaugural tale is "The Adventures Of Little Mouse" ($11.95 in paperback from CreateSpace; also for Amazon Kindle). The book introduces problem-solving methods in a winsome way and encourages adults to read the story to kids and talk about it.

Little Mouse lives "in his underground home up on Little Butte Creek. … Paradise Lake was as gorgeous as it could be, with its sky-blue water, fluffy snow-white clouds overhead, and green forest shorelines accompanied by meandering paths." No ordinary mouse, he believes "he should apply virtue, hope, and charity in his daily life so that he could be an instrument of good rather than bad."

One day a five-foot diameter boulder "rolled off the canyon slope and landed next to his mountain home. It was only a matter of time before it would crush his entire home." That is a problem!

Little Mouse uses TRAP (Thinking, Reflecting, Applying, and Persisting) to brainstorm ways of removing the boulder; yet even with others' help, nothing seems to work. So Little Mouse tries PST (Paradigm Shift Test), visiting human construction at the old Covered Bridge, looking for out-of-the-box ideas. (The journey downstream is itself perilous and he almost becomes "mouse mignon" for a big trout.)

Little Mouse nearly despairs until a chance encounter with men using a steel-bar-and-cylinder to lift a car and change a tire. It's a lever--"That's the paradigm shift!" He could use a plank and block of wood to leverage the boulder. (An epilogue teaches how with a lever one can lift an adult with one finger.)

When a huge storm threatens the smaller animals, Little Mouse's character is tested. He must choose between protecting his house and helping others.

The story directs the reader to an upcoming sequel where the power of the lever extends "to the emotional and mental powers as well." Stay tuned.


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