- Picture Books
- Ages 4–8
- Comedy
Mina
Mina is a mouse with a very particular collection and a father who will do anything to protect her. When a cat arrives, Matthew Forsythe's second picture book becomes something unexpected: a story about danger, disguise, and the specific courage of parents, told with his signature deadpan and a plot twist that earns its surprise.
- Best for4–8
- FormatPicture
- Length44 pp
- Read aloud~9 min
The vibe
What it’s like.
Style
- Conversational
- Comedic
- Literary
Tone
- Funny
- Gentle
- Suspenseful
- Whimsical
- Absurdist
- Heartwarming
Themes
Experience meters
What’s it about?
The story.
Mina is a small mouse who lives in a tree stump with her father and her carefully assembled collection of objects. She is, as Forsythe establishes in his typical economical style, very particular about things. Then a cat appears, not in an ambiguous Klassen-ish way, but as a genuinely large predator arriving in a small creature's world. What follows involves mistaken identity, real peril, parental love stretched to its limits, and courage, all delivered through Forsythe's signature visual grammar: animal faces that give almost nothing away, a rich muted palette, text that hands most of the narrative weight to the pictures. More emotionally complex than Pokko and with higher stakes, the parent-child bond and the question of what a father will do to keep his child safe give it unexpected depth.
Fit check
Right for your child?
Where it lands by age
- 1
- 3
- 5
- 7
- 9
- 11
- 13
- Best fit · 4–8
- Read aloud · 3–8
- Independent · 5–8
Prose load
Light
Visual support
Very high
Reluctant-reader friendly
Very
Read-aloud quality
Excellent
Works well for
- Reading aloud
- Reading together
- Gift-buying
- Reluctant readers
Preview before sharing if a child is sensitive to: scary imagery, animal harm.
Bedtime suitability
3 / 5 · Workable
Sensitive-child
4 / 5 · Good fit
Graphic intensity
1 / 5 · None
Best for
- Parent child bond
- Picture book adults love
- Peril with humour
- Gift book
Avoid if
No common reasons to avoid this one — a rare clean sweep on the sensitivity flags.
Particularly good for children who are…
- Anxiety and worry
- Nightmares or fears
- Making friends
In the classroom
How it works in school.
A gorgeously illustrated, gently suspenseful read-aloud about a mouse and a 'squirrel' — a story-time treat rich for inference.
A book children love that happens to support school — never a stand-in for the texts a class is taught with. Reviewed for the classroom · June 2026.
Why it lands
Why they love it.
Why kids love it
The specific delight is the cat that isn't a squirrel — Mina the mouse with her particular collection, her father bringing home what he insists is just a squirrel, Mina the only one who's noticed it's clearly a cat. The Forsythe picture book on the dramatic-irony joke with proper parental stakes underneath.
- Surviving danger
- Trickery and cleverness
- Animal companions
- Family belonging
Why parents love it
The Matthew Forsythe second picture book — deadpan visual grammar, mistaken-identity comedy doubling as a story about what a father will do for his child. More emotional weight than Pokko; same signature animal-faces giving nothing away.
- Shared humour
- Beautiful illustrations
- Conversation starter
- Great writing
About the author & illustrator
Matthew Forsythe.
If you liked this
Three ways out of this book.
If you liked this, try…
Lateral matches. Same shelf, different texture.
Come into this from…
Easier or preparing reads — perfect lead-ins.
Where to go next…
Escalation reads — a step up in scale, silliness, or stakes.
More like this…
Books that share themes and topics with this one.
Buy or borrow
Pick up a copy.
- Bookshop.org ↗
- Waterstones ↗
- Amazon UK ↗
- Hive ↗
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