The Mouse Triptych - Ian Thomson

The Mouse Triptych is a trilogy of stories where mice, in one way or another, tangle with humans. In A Stroke of Genius, a mastermind among mice, seeking refuge from a bitter winter, finds his way into a big Victorian house. Its once-grand rooms are now occupied by a shabby old scholar who has a pathological fear of mice. Man and mouse engage in a life and death struggle until, at a stroke, the odds are reversed. Polemikos is the dark story of a mouse born inside the Trojan Horse. He believes his mission is to save Troy from her doom and from the vulgar Greeks. His short life inside the stinking belly of the horse moves to a devastating climax as he follows the psychopath, Pyrrhus, in his murderous path through the blazing city. The reader is left to decide whether little Polemikos changes the course of history or not. The third tale, The Downing Street Cat, is lighter in tone, though it contains playful satire. It is set inside Number 10 Downing Street, the seat of the UK Government, where the Cabinet (of mice, of course) is deliberating about how to get rid of the Cat. The Minister for Nocturnal Affairs has a remarkably devious plan. The stories are held together by the low esteem in which mice hold men and there is a comic vein which runs through them even at the darkest moments. Each can be read separately, but in fact, they are subtly hinged by the idea that humans have less control of their destinies than they might suppose.