From Barnes & Noble
Forced to flee the rat-infested city, the Deptford Mice rapidly discover that that countryside can be just as inhospitable. When these sympathetic rodents become entangled in a series of brutal murders, they begin sniffing around for a culprit. Unfortunately, the young girl they most suspect is just another victim.
From the Publisher
When the Deptford Mice flee to the countryside, they never expect to find themselves embroiled in a series of murders. The country mice suspect that headstrong city mouse, Audrey, is the culprit. But the truth is far more sinister-for Jupiter now reaches vengefully from the dead.
Publishers Weekly
From Robin Jarvis comes The Crystal Prison, the second book in the Deptford Mice Trilogy that began with The Dark Portal (see Fiction Reprints below). Finally, the evil rat Jupiter is dead. But with the sewers still infested with his minions, the mice flee the city for the country. However, a rash of murders blights the once idyllic setting, forcing the mice to confront the accusing townspeople and the evil lurking in their midst. (Sept.) Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information.
Publishers Weekly
In this follow-up to The Dark Portal, which PW called in a starred review, "a spooky and enthralling animal fantasy just right for Redwall fans," book two in the Deptford Mice Trilogy finds the evil rat Jupiter dead, but a rash of murders blights the countryside. Ages 10-up. (Sept.)
Children's Literature
The saga of the Deptford Mice is continued in this second volume of the trilogy that began with The Dark Portal (SeaStar, 2000) and also includes The Final Reckoning (SeaStar, 2002). First published in Great Britain in 1989, these books have long been familiar to British readers and to Americans who may have discovered them on travels abroad. In a fantasy world that feels like a cross between Redwall and The Borrowers, readers are drawn into the lives of a community of mice who are threatened by the Lord of Darkness, Jupiter, who rules the sewers with his hoard of rat minions. The Green Mouse, the deity worshipped by the mice, seems to be no match for the power of the evil one. In this volume, Audrey, who proved herself an unwilling hero in the first book, must accompany Madame Akkikuyu, a fortune-telling squirrel, to the country as part of a bargain to save a friend's life. There she is party to a series of strange events that resolve themselves with the death of Madame Akkikuyu, setting Audrey free to return to Deptford and her own people. Only the reader knows that the Lord of Darkness still lurks, setting the stage for the concluding book in the trilogy. With its stock characters and chapter-ending cliffhangers, The Crystal Prison offers fast, entertaining reading for fantasy lovers. 2001, SeaStar, $17.95. Ages 10 to 14. Reviewer: Susan Stan
School Library Journal
Gr 5-8-In this sequel to The Dark Portal (SeaStar, 2000), a young mouse named Oswald falls ill, and the powerful squirrel Starwife decrees that he can only be healed if his friend Audrey accompanies a formerly evil but now pitiful rat named Madame Akkikuyu to the countryside. In the country, a bucolic existence is threatened by an evil spirit who uses Akkikuyu to gain power and wreak havoc on the mice who live there. Although this book stands on its own, readers who aren't familiar with the first volume might become impatient with the first section, which introduces a multitude of characters and moves slowly, impeded by old-fashioned, florid prose. The pace picks up in the countryside, where an ever-hungry owl and the mysterious spirit bring menace and tragedy to the close-knit community of field mice who live there, and the final chapters are breathtakingly thrilling. Some literal-minded readers may wonder how a mouse could stride or possess a waist and long flowing hair, but fans of Brian Jacques's "Redwall" series (Philomel) and Avi's "Tales from Dimwood Forest" series (HarperCollins) will likely relish this tale.-Eva Mitnick, Los Angeles Public Library Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information.
Kirkus Reviews
Redwall meets Goosebumps in the middle of the Deptford Mice Trilogy. Frivolous young Audrey is assigned to accompany the rat fortune-teller Madame Akkikuyu, who lost her wits after confronting the sinister Jupiter, and now fantasizes that Audrey is her best friend. Audrey, her brother Arthur, and their friend the fieldmouse, Twit, escort Akkikuyu to Fennywolde, Twit's rural home. But this once-idyllic enclave is now terrorized by a barn owl's predations, and dispirited by the puritanical ranting of Isaac Nettle, devotee of the Green Mouse. While Akkikuyu's bravery and healing potions win the hearts of the Fennywolders, Audrey's city ways earn sniffs of disapproval. As corn shrivels in the heat, and a mysterious murderer stalks the night, dislike turns to suspicion and to mob hysteria. Only the tragic sacrifices of two unlikely heroes save Audrey from lynching and free Fennywolde from a lurking evil. Like its predecessor ("The Dark Portal", 2000), this is a terrific page-turner, drenched in foreboding atmosphere and punctuated with grisly discoveries and sinister revelations. If only Jarvis could write memorable characters! The Fennywolders never develop beyond caricatures of vanity, nobility, fanaticism, etc.; even the personalities of Audrey and Akkikuyu seem driven arbitrarily by the demands of the plot. Not that fans will care-not when they can indulge in delicious shudders at the evil spirit Nicodemus's lurid whispering, the abusive Nettle's vicious ravings, and (best of all) the veiled prophetic hints of even darker manifestations to come. Shivery good fun. "(Fiction. 10-14)"
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