RATS - Hardcover

Zindel, Paul

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0786803398 ISBN 13: 9780786803392

Publisher: Disney-Hyperion, 1999

Synopsis

When mutant rats escape from a dump on Staten Island and wreak havoc on the town's citizens, quick-thinking Sara and her younger brother stop the rats from taking over New York City and ending civilization as we know it.

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Reviews

Gr 6-9-Staten Island and the rest of New York City are threatened by an invasion of vicious killer rats in this gory, makes-your-skin-crawl thriller. The epicenter of the disaster turns out to be a huge landfill brimming over with decades worth of rotting garbage, right next to the quiet neighborhood where Sarah Macafee, 15, and her brother Michael, 10, live with their widowed father. Mr. Macafee just happens to be the city sanitation officer in charge of the landfill, which is in the process of being paved over with a layer of asphalt. The horror begins one summer morning with rats emerging from residents' toilets, hot tubs, and in-ground swimming pools. Sarah and Michael discover a neighbor dead in her car, and alert their father that rodents from the landfill are mounting an attack on their neighborhood. Readers looking for gruesome details are treated to numerous descriptions of bodily dismemberment by these traditionally maligned mammals, and the jolts of horror recur at regular intervals while Sarah and her brother survive several cliff-hanger escapes. Just in the nick of time, Sarah figures out a way to halt the vermin in their tracks and put an end to the bloodbath that engulfs a crowded Manhattan entertainment center. Zindel's style is fast paced and the plot is chock-full of shivery, stomach-churning action. Young readers will certainly rest easier once Sarah uses her wits to end a nightmare of carnage.-Douglas Wooley, Brooklyn Public Library, NY

Copyright 1999 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

Zindel (Reef of Death) churns out another variation of his teen versus man-eating beast theme. Again, he relies heavily on horror, gore and gimmicks. The first scene graphically depicts a man being devoured by a mob of vicious rats, and the rest of this nightmarish thriller follows suit, as billions of rodents invade New York City after their feeding ground (a garbage dump in Staten Island) is buried under asphalt. Enter Sarah, the 15-year-old daughter of the landfill supervisor; like many of Zindel's recent heroes and heroines, Sarah possesses the courage, intelligence and creativity needed to take charge of a life-threatening situation and bring order out of chaos. Unfortunately, her scheme to "hypnotize" the rats has less narrative oomph than the string of grizzly deaths occurring before the story's climax. The book does contain a somewhat watered-down message about environmentalism, but readers caught up in the fast-paced, blood-spewing action may not take time to ponder the moral. Ages 10-14. (Aug.)

Copyright 1999 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Disney-Hyperion
• Publication date: 1999
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0786803398
• ISBN 13: 9780786803392
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 176