The Amazing Maurice and his Educated Rodents: Difference between revisions

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{{work}}
{{work|page=Discworld (Literature)/The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents}}
{{page needs original description}}
{{Infobox book
{{work |page title =Discworld (Literature)/The Amazing Maurice and Hishis Educated Rodents}}
| image = Theamazingmaurice-paperback.webp
| caption =
| author = Terry Pratchett
| central theme =
| elevator pitch =
| genre = Fantasy
| franchise = Discworld
| preceded by = The Last Hero
| followed by = Night Watch (Discworld)
| publication date = 2001
}}
The 28th ''[[Discworld]]'' book, and the first written for young adults.
 
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Rats that fight...
 
Maurice, a streetwise tomcat, [[Monster Protection Racket|has the perfect money-making scam]]. He's found a stupid-looking kid who plays a pipe, and he has his very own plague of rats -- ratsrats—rats who are strangely educated, so Maurice can no longer think of them as "lunch". [[The Pied Piper of Hamelin|And everyone knows the stories about rats and pipers...]]
 
But when they reach the stricken town of Bad Blintz, the little con suddenly goes down the drain. For someone there is playing a different tune. A dark, shadowy tune. Something very, very bad is waiting in the cellars.
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It's not a game any more. It's a rat-eat-rat world down there. And that might only be the start...
 
{{tropelist}}
{{tropelist|page={{SUBPAGENAME}}}}
* [[Arc Words]]: "And you can always trust a cat to be a cat."
* [[Ape Shall Never Kill Ape]]: "No rat shall kill another rat" is one of Dangerous Beans' newer ideas.
* [[Badass]]: Darktan, the Clan's trap-disarming expert {{spoiler|and eventual leader}}.
* {{spoiler|[[Balancing Death's Books]]: Maurice gives up one of his lives to save Dangerous Beans.}}
* [[Beastly Bloodsports]]: One of the central conflicts involves the terrier rings where the terriers compete to kill the greatest number of rats.
* [[Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass]]: What do you get when you [[Mind Rape]] intelligent talking cat that is terrified sh*tless for the reason of being surrounded by hundreds of VERY big rats? When you mind rape it so hard that there's no mind left any more, that all the traces of intelligence and even common sense completely disappear? Answer: "A clever cat, but still... Just a cat. Nothing but a cat. All the way to the forest and the cave, the fang and the claw... Just a cat. [[Arc Words|And you can always trust a cat to be a cat.]]", indeed. Cue [[Crowning Moment of Awesome]].
* [[Beware the Nice Ones]]: ''Keith''. He was going to put rat poison in the rat catchers' tea before Malicia though of a better plan.
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* [[Body Horror]]: Keith's description to the Ratcatchers of Number three rat poison. {{spoiler|It was only laxative they were given, but the effects of the poison are real and no less horrifying}}.
* [[Blood Sport]]: Hamnpork is thrown into a ring with a terrier. This does not go as expected.
* [[A Boy and His X]]: Averted. Maurice does not like being referred to as anyone's cat.
* [[Break the Cutie]]: {{spoiler|Dangerous Beans dealing with the fact that Mr Bunnsy, a children's book where animals are less animal, is fiction.}}
* [[Carnivore Confusion]]: Maurice is very annoyed to be afflicted with this.
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* [[Con Man|Con Cat]]: Maurice is the brains of the operation.
* [[Crazy Prepared]]: Oh, you wacky Malicia.
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* [[Does This Remind You of Anything?]]: The street sign the rats made looks an awful lot like...
* [[Distaff Counterpart]]: Malicia's storytelling aunts are this to the Brothers Grimm.
* [[Do Not Go Gentle]] / [[Don't Fear the Reaper]]: Darktan manages to combine both of these tropes in his [[Rousing Speech]] to the rats: death in itself is not something to be feared, but the [[Anthropomorphic Personification|Bone Rat]] will only pass you over if you can look him in the eyes. Given that it's the Disc, he's likely not speaking figuratively.
* [[Early-Bird Cameo]]: The Amazing Maurice and Hishis Educated Rodents (and their scam) were first mentioned in ''[[Discworld/Reaper Man|Reaper Man]]'', although most people reading it assumed Maurice was a human conman who trained rats.
* [[Fake Ultimate Hero]]: The Piper.
* [[Fat and Skinny]]: The rat catchers. Lampshaded by Malicia, who assumes that since they're the bumbling villains, there's a [[Man Behind the Man]].
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** {{spoiler|And Hamnpork.}}
* [[Hive Mind]]: {{spoiler|The Rat King.}}
* [[Humans Are Bastardsthe Real Monsters]]: Since the story is told from the point of view of intelligent animals.
* [[I Have a Family]]: One of the ratcatchers try this. It doesn't work.
* [[Inexplicably Identical Individuals]]: Sergeant Doppelpunkt and Corporal Knopf (German for "Colon" and "Nobbs").
* [[Intellectual Animal]]: Dangerous Beans and Peaches in particular.
* [[Lampshade Hanging]]: Often by Malicia, occasionally by Maurice, most of all by both together.
{{quote| '''Malicia''': How come a cat knows a word like that?<br />
'''Maurice''': Everyone's got to know ''something'' }}
* [[Laxative Prank]]: Malicia puts laxative powder in the Rat Catchers' tea, then tells them they've been poisoned and holds the antidote hostage until they do as she says. {{spoiler|The "antidote" is laxative powder too.}}
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** The Ratcatchers themselves have a variant going, extorting money from the town to "get rid of" a plague of rats that don't exist, except in their own rat-breeding cages.
* [[No More for Me]]: Seargeant Doppenpunkt, {{spoiler|after seeing two rats band together and attack another rat. ''And then give him a salute''.}}
* [["Not Making This Up" Disclaimer]]: Some details about rats, mentioned in the author's notes.
* [[Obfuscating Stupidity]]: The ratcatchers. No 2 has to make an effort to sound grammatically incorrect.
* [[Oblivious Guilt Slinging]]: Maurice swears he will never eat prey that can talk but is afraid he learned to speak by eating one of the intelligent rats (who had a speech impediment).
* [[One Last Job]]: Bad Blintz was going to be this.
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** The large medical kit and the small medical kit come from [[Tomb Raider]] and probably other similar games.
** Malicia suggets the perfect time to go solve a mystery...
{{quote| '''Malicia:''' Of course, it would be more... satisfying if we were [[The Famous Five|four children ]] [[Scooby Doo|and a dog]].}}
* [[Sidenote Full Story]]: It started out as a one-line joke in ''[[Discworld/Reaper Man|Reaper Man]]''.
* [[Smarter Than You Look]]: Keith. He may be stupid-looking, but it doesn't mean he's actually stupid.
* [[Swarm of Rats]]: [[Played for Laughs]], at first.
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[[Category:{{Discworld (Literature)]]novels}}
[[Category:{{Carnegie Medal]]}}
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[[Category:Young Adult Literature]]
[[Category:Carnegie Medal]]
[[Category:The Amazing Maurice And His Educated Rodents]]
[[Category:Discworld]]
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[[Category{{DEFAULTSORT:Discworld (Literature)/The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents]], The}}