Badger's New House

Reviewed: August 20, 2004
By: Robin Muller
Publisher: Scholastic Books
32 pages, $6.99

I'm a sucker for little animal stories of the Wind in the Willows type, and that's what drew me to pull this one out of the packet of review books which recently arrived on my desk. Robin Muller did not disappoint me. I was quite sure she would not. Just the illustrations had that comfortable feeling that put me in the right place. The story did too.

Badger lives in a charming little house which has a few shortcomings. After one roof rattling storm he decides that it has been damaged too much to repair, and moves to a larger mansion, in which he is not at all comfortable. He keeps going back to his old home, where Grandma Mouse loves the place, but thinks it needs just a little work.

One thing at a time Badger undertakes all the repairs he had avoided when he lived there and, in the end, the cottage is just perfect once more. There are two other little problems that I'll leave you to discover.

This is a gentle story about decision making and finding satisfaction, and about what it is that makes a place a home.

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