Firmin: Adventures of a Metropolitan Lowlife - Sam Savage

Firrrrrrrrrrrrrrrminnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn!  Ok, so this is the story of a rat who reads books and it is sad because he dies in the end, and I don't see how that's a spoiler AT ALL because he is a rat and they live for, like, eight minutes.  Plus the Philip Pullman quote on the back is all 'the final impression is one of delicate tragedy' and if that doesn't say 'the rat dies' then I don't know what does.

Would it make you feel better if I tell you that he dies at a ripe old age, and that he lives a long, ratty life?

Ok so.  Firmin is a rat and he is born in the basement of a bookstore and because he is the runt there is no teat for him so he subsists on book pages and this miraculously enables him to read.  Ha ha, what?  Ok fine, but you're reading a book narrated by a rat so just go with it.

And his life consists of what you would expect a rat's life to consist of, namely garbage and pipes and skulking.  But also he READS BOOKS and makes literary references so basically this is just Ratatouille but with books instead of food, and it is clever and sweet.  And melancholy, because it sucks to be super-erudite and also, you're a rat (also, you die). 

Aaaaaaaaand that's it.  This review was brought to you the Bibliolatrist, whose opinion I will go with on pretty much anything (despite the Drood Discrepancy), by my secret internet-lover Lauren, who bought it for me because my library sucks at things like having every book ever, and my stupid fat eye infection that makes it hard to look at screens.

Eight and a half caterpillars.

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