"Boy!" said Ralph to himself, his whiskers quivering with excitement. "Boy, oh boy!" Feeling that this was an important moment in his life, he took hold of the handgrips. They felt good and solid beneath his paws. Yes, this motorcycle was a good machine all right.
Ralph the mouse ventures out from behind the piney knothole in the wall of his hotel-room home, scrambles up the telephone wire to the end table, and climbs aboard the toy motorcycle left there by a young guest. His thrill ride does not last long. The ringing telephone startles Ralph, and he and the motorcycle take a terrible fall - right to the bottom of a metal wastebasket. Luckily, Keith, the owner of the motorcycle, returns to find his toy. Keith rescues Ralph and teaches him how to ride the bike. Thus begins a great friendship and many awesome adventures. Once a mouse can ride a motorcyle ... almost anything can happen!
"Pb-pb-b-b-b. Pb-pb-b-b-b." With these magic vocables, Ralph the mouse revs up a dream come true--his very own motorcycle. Living in a knothole in a hotel room, young Ralph has seen plenty of families come and go, some more generous with their crumbs than others. But when young Keith and his parents check in to the hotel, Ralph gets his first chance to check out. He has always fantasized about venturing beyond the second floor, maybe even outside. Curiosity overcomes caution, and Ralph must have a go at Keith's toy motorcycle. Soon, the headstrong mouse finds himself in a pickle, when all he wanted was to ride a motorcycle. Lucky for him, the boy understands how it is. When he discovers Ralph in his thwarted attempt to abscond with the toy bike, Keith generously encourages the rodent to ride. He even teaches him the simple trick of starting the motorcycle: "You have to make a noise... pb-pb-b-b-b." The subsequent situations Ralph motors into require quick thinking and grownup-sized courage. The team of Beverly Cleary and Louis Darling has been a great favorite for decades, introducing young chapter readers to Ramona, Beezus, Henry, and of course Ralph the mouse. (Ages 8 and older) --Emilie Coulter
Customer Reviews:
Avg. Customer Rating: 4.5 / 5.0
Plot! Character! Action!:
This book is a rare treasure, perfectly pitched to read aloud to my five-year-old boys. First, it's a lovely tale, perfectly combining gentle, humourous real world observation (hotels, vacuum cleaners) with just enough fantasy elements to keep childish imagination tantalised (a talking mouse! who rides a motorbike!). Most appealing of all are Cleary's full, three-dimensional characters - just as I remember from my own earth-shattering discovery of Ramona decades ago. You can't help but relate to a... more info
A Kids Review!:
Ralph, the mouse, was riding his motorcycle when he fell off the table and into the trash can. He waited an hour. Then Kith came into the story. He saw Ralph and his motorcycle (which was Kith's) and it was bent up. Kith took the motorcycle out, and Ralph climbed up Kith's arm. Later, Ralph was captured by two teachers. They let him go. He was hanging on a vine. An owl saw him and tried to eat him. I like Ralph because he had a lot of humor. He reminds me of me because he likes to eat. My favorite part... more info
Great Children's Story:
My three grandchildren ages 9, 5, 3 all love this story by Beverly Cleary. They have listened to it several times in a row and still want to listen again!
THE book to get my sometimes reluctant reader interested:
My son is 7 and an advanced reader, but he doesn't pick up a book for fun--until we checked this one out of the library. Now he is interested in all Beverly Cleary books. This classic from my childhood (the first Cleary book I ever read too) still holds up. The interactions between Ralph and Keith are realistic and sweet, Ralph's adventures on the motorcycle are thrilling, and the world inside the hotel is vivid. While my son still prefers my reading this to him, he has wanted to read a chapter here and... more info
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