I was a Rat!, Or, The Scarlet Slippers is a deeply moving and cleverly constructed fairy-tale reinterpretation by master storyteller Philip Pullman. The story begins when a small, mysterious boy appears on the doorstep of the kindly but childless couple, Bob and Joan. The boy can only utter the cryptic phrase, "I was a rat!" Despite this strangeness, Bob and Joan adopt him and name him Roger, attempting to teach him human ways. However, when Roger gets lost, he becomes a public sensation, quickly identified by a sensationalist press as a terrifying "Monster" or "rodent fiend" threatening the town. The narrative is a sharp, subtle parody of modern media hysteria and mob mentality, cleverly weaving in elements of the classic Cinderella story (hence the subtitle, "The Scarlet Slippers"). The central question becomes not what Roger is, but who will save him from the authorities determined to exterminate him, ultimately requiring a friend in a very high—and magical—place to intervene and reveal the truth of his enchanted existence.
