“Rivka Galchen delivers joy and cleverness reminiscent of The Phantom Tollbooth , Alice in Wonderland , and Hayao Miyazaki movies” (NPR, Best Books of 2019) in Rat Rule 79 , a brain-twisting adventure story about friendship, growing up, and peanut-butter-pickle sandwiches. Fred and her math-teacher mom are always on the move, and Fred is getting sick of it. She’s about to have yet another birthday in a new place without friends. On the eve of turning thirteen, Fred sees something strange in the living room: her mother, dressed for a party, standing in front of an enormous paper lantern―which she steps into and disappears. Fred follows her and finds herself in the Land of Impossibility―a loopily illogical place where time has been outlawed by a mad Rat Queen, along with birthday parties and, most cruelly, peanut butter. Fred meets Downer, a downcast white elephant, and Gogo, a pugnacious mongoose mother of seventeen, who help her in her quest to find her mom. Together they must brave dungeons, Insult Fish, a Know-It-Owl, Fearsome Ferlings, and ultimately the Rat Queen herself―and solve an ageless riddle to escape certain doom. Gorgeously illustrated and reminiscent of The Phantom Tollbooth and The Wonderful Wizard of Oz , Rivka Galchen’s Rat Rule 79 is an instant classic for curious readers of all ages. Praise for Rat Rule 79 : “ Rat Rule 79 is the adventure I didn’t know I wanted until it started, just like it’s the book you don’t yet know you’re going to love. We have been waiting for this book our entire lives.” ―Lemony Snicket “On the night before her 13th birthday, Fred can’t sleep. She gets out of bed and sees her mother walk through a lantern. Fred follows her into a magical land filled with highly rational, unreasonable rules (or is it highly reasonable, irrational rules?). In the ensuing puzzles and conundrums, Rivka Galchen delivers joy and cleverness reminiscent of The Phantom Tollbooth , Alice in Wonderland and Hayao Miyazaki movies as she playfully exposes the holes in logic as presented through language. From the quirky chapter headings to the deadpan illustrations by Elena Megalos, it is a wonderful read (and re-read) for kids and adults.” ―Philipp Goedicke, NPR Best Books of 2019 “ Rat Rule 79 is an impossibly perfect book: a Mobius strip where the love loops continuously between mothers’ daughters and daughters’ mothers, law and disorder, the lost and the found. Fred is a heroine for the ages―a twelve-year old savant of mathematical and emotional truths and a connoisseur of peanut butter and pickle sandwiches, Fred is smart enough to navigate irrational lands, demands, and numbers, and brave enough to love the strangest strangers. Rat Rule 79 belongs on a shelf of classics with The Phantom Tollbooth , Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH , and The Last Unicorn . How can it be that Galchen's epic, so utterly, enchantingly new, also gave me the happiest deja vu while reading? How can the Dark, Dark Woods be such an illuminating place? These and other paradoxes fill Galchen's astonishing, hilarious, mind-and-heart-expanding book. As I read, I thought, ‘I can't wait to share this with my daughter, son, mother, brother, sister, best friend…’ a number set that eventually swelled to include: everyone.” ―Karen Russell, author of Swamplandia “Along with new friends Downer the elephant and Gogo the mongoose, Fred embarks on an epic series of adventures to find her mother and locate the infamous Rat Queen. Peppered throughout the sweetly playful text are tidbits of wisdom that highlight the perceived injustices of youth and the qualities of growing older. Galchen’s charming middle-grade debut is filled with life lessons wrapped in occasionally over-the-top wordplay, and Megalos’s whimsical salmon-tinged illustrations provide a delightful counterpoint…. the novel’s underlying messages are as timeless as its tethers to classic works of children’s fantasy.” ― Publishers Weekly “It’s impossible to read Galchen’s novel without being reminded of Norton Juster’s The Phantom Tollbooth . It revels in wordplay and the off-kilter logic that governs the fantastic land that Fred, a nearly 13-year-old girl, enters by stepping through a giant paper lantern in pursuit of her mother…. It is an immensely imaginative, mind-bending journey that explores dealing with change and growing up. Short, creatively titled chapters feature line drawings and lovely illustrations in red and slate blue. Galchen’s first book for children is full of heart and celebrates unconventional thinking.” ―Julia Smith, Booklist "I love this book. It’s a wonder. I wish I’d had Rat Rule 79 when I was a boy. I’d have been obsessed with Fred and her adventures and reread her funny sweet story a hundred times, always finding something new.” ―James Gleick, author of The Information and Isaac Newton “Lewis Carroll, Norton Juster, Tove Jansson, Russell Hoban; like them, Rivka Galchen has written a book for children and adults th