On this farm, every creature wants something and is willing to plot and scheme to get it. The house mice enjoy plenty, while the barn mice struggle to survive, terrorized by a fierce cat. One idealistic mouse appeals to the Parliament of Mice, but he is sent on a hopeless mission to bell the cat, exposing the corruption of his miniature society. A cock rules the barn with his proud song but is afraid to descend to the barnyard because of an ominous recurring dream. A clever vixen—hoping to show up her fox husband, a notorious trickster—plots to catch the cock by inspiring a feminist awakening in his wife, the hen. Meanwhile, a boy escaping the troubles of his own world listens to a mysterious goose he calls Maman, whose stories twist Mother Goose rhymes into dark, cautionary fables.
All these characters, humans and beasts, are rich with desires and aspirations, vanities and foibles. Their intertwined tales, told with vivid imagery, humor, and insight, weave a fable about power, justice, cruelty, and love—culminating in a wild and unforgettable climax that is tragicomic but ultimately hopeful.

Praise for The Parliament of Mice

“A capacious and thought-provoking page-turner. Robert Epstein has reverse-engineered postmodern fiction, bringing it back to its roots in medieval beast fable and mock epic, with its wit, whimsy, and formal freedom, while retaining the metaphysical outlook of our own disenchanted times. The book couldn’t be timelier, reflecting on social, political, economic, and ethical ills of the immediate present. Yet its anchor in literature of the far past ensures that we understand those ills to be ones that have long been with us, in one form or another. It provokes guffaws, tears, and some serious musing. And when its several plot lines come together in the end, it provokes sheer admiration. Anyone open to fiction that plays with conventions will find it completely accessible; readers who are familiar with Chaucer and other medieval literature will be additionally entranced by its thoroughgoing dialogue with that tradition.”

—Robert J. Meyer-Lee, author of Reading Geoffrey Chaucer: An Introduction

“The Parliament of Mice is a triumph: a sharp and surprising contemporary fable in the tradition of Reynard the Fox – but with the brilliant vixen Hermeline at its center, alongside a young mouse who dreams of love and justice, a hen who experiences a feminist awakening, and a drowsy farm boy who must reckon with the world within and beyond ‘the subtle fence’ of the barnyard. Drawing from Chaucerian tales, Aesop’s fables, and animal fables by writers from Jean de La Fontaine to Beatrix Potter, Robert Epstein has given us a gem of a novel: wildly original, deftly written, keenly satirical, yet full of wit, charm, wisdom, and heart. Its revelations are so engaging that I could not put it down.”

—Nalini Jones, author of The Unbroken Coast

“Fables within fables within fables. A joyful romp alongside a menagerie of common critters whose archetypes and escalating moral concerns, writ deceptively small, grow increasingly ambiguous, hurtling toward a
cleansing burst of violence worthy of the Greeks—or perhaps Tarantino. Not your children’s bedtime stories.”

—Scott Lambridis, author of St. Ulphia’s Dead