Jumping Mouse

“Well, crouch down as far as you can, and then jump up as far as you can,” said the frog.

So the mouse did. He crouched down on the river bank until he was a tight little bundle, and then he leapt up into the sky. He jumped higher than the flowers, and then the trees, nearly scraping his ears on the branches. He went higher and higher, and then across the trees he caught a glimpse of the Sacred Mountains....

And so the little mouse was named Jumping Mouse by the frog, and he started his journey to the Sacred Mountains....

Jumping Mouse re-tells a classic Native American hero story about how a little mouse had the courage to leave his family's warm nest in the roots of a giant tree, find his true name, and journey to the sacred mountains.

Mary Moore, daughter of sculptor Henry Moore, illustrates the story with vivid watercolor sketches.

(Ages 6 and up)

Brian Patten was born in 1946 in Liverpool, and grew up in the docklands. He left school at fifteen, becoming a junior reporter on The Bootle Times, with responsibility for writing the popular music column. He is one of the most accessible and popular poets working today. He made his name in the 1960s in the Liverpool trio with Adrian Henri & Roger McGough. Their main aim was to make poetry immediate and accessible for their audience, and their joint anthology, The Mersey Sound (1967), has been credited as the most significant anthology of the twentieth century for its success in bringing poetry to new audiences. Brian Patten's individual strength is his ability to write and perform a powerful mix of serious and humorous work. His poems have been translated into many languages. Patten is also well-known for his bestselling poetry collections for children, most famously Gargling with Jelly: A Collection of Poems (1985) and Juggling with Gerbils (2000). His collection for children, The Blue and Green Ark: An Alphabet for Planet Earth (1999), won a Cholmondeley Award in 2002. He has also written a novel for children, Mr. Moon's Last Case (1975), which won an award from the Mystery Writers of America Guild. He lives between London and Devon and has been honoured with the Freedom of the City of Liverpool. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Litrature and of both Liverpool University and John Moores University.

Mary Moore is an illustrator of children's books. She is an artist and fashion designer, owns a vintage dress shop, and has designed shirts for such artists as Eric Clapton and the band The Animals. She helped establish the Henry Moore Foundation in 1977, sponsor of an exhibition at Tate Britain.