Mouse

by Claudia Blood

A teenage smuggler, a devastating illness, what will she sacrifice to save the survivors?

Being tiny and tough helps Mouse smuggle valuables between a series of caverns constructed beneath Earth's surface. Cut off from the rest of the caverns, the bottom level relies upon her trading.

When sickness strikes, she must climb to the top, but instead of getting the vitamins they so desperately need, she brings the Company's wrath down upon her community.

Hunted. Guilty. Devastated.

Her only recourse is to do the unthinkable -- sabotage the infrastructure of the caverns.

Mouse must become the villain to be a hero. Renegades Rising is a five-book series, of which the first four books can stand alone. You do not need to have read the previous book to enjoy this one, but Mouse's full story will not be resolved until the final installment. This novella ends in a mild cliffhanger.

148 pages, Kindle Edition

Published February 16, 2023

About the author

In spite of a busy life wrapped around a military husband, two young children, a dog, bunnies, and a day job, Claudia Blood manages to pen cozy, urban, and science fantasies.

My upcoming books:
A Christmas Tail, Horizon Echo, and Scale of the Dragon

Reviews

[Cath · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is part of the Renegades Rising series and the main character is Mouse (14), who lives in the Hole, a series of caverns and homes made in the ground beneath earth’s surface after it was destroyed by humans. There are different levels to the underground homes and where she lives is near the bottom, level six, with her boyfriend Darius, a gang leader. But when she realises he is about to have her killed off and replaced, like she has heard of about his previous girlfriends, she decides to run away from him and others. She has worked as a smuggler for years, working her way through ductwork between the lower levels, but she knows she wouldn’t be welcome by the miners below her nor the bat farmers above. Her only chance was to make it up to level DL-6 above the Hole, the doorway to which was guarded by Darius’ thugs. Luckily she knows a way around that, even if it is dangerous and means climbing along small ledges and through places no one else would go. She uses her secret map of the deep levels (DL) and waits near a grate at DL-6 to see if it is safe to exit.

A man is standing near the exit grate and sends some others away, before telling her he knows she is there and that it’s safe to come out! His name is Tully and he doesn’t lie, something she has the ability to recognise, which comes in very useful. Her explorations over the next year see her making a contact on DL-5, Doctor Chand, which leads her to a trader, Mr P, on DL-3, where she can trade the sparklies they find in the Hole, for supplies people ask her to get. A lot of those on the lower levels are sick in some way or another. Someone she found a medical text for, has figured out the weak bones in the young, bad skin and losing hair, is all down to a lack of vitamins in the limited food the inhabitants of the Hole survive on. Tully asks her to find a way all the way up to DL-1, to trade with Mr P who has managed to move, for vitamins to add to the water and save their people. His girlfriend Amber has a more detailed map, which shows routes all the way up, well past where Mouse has dared to go so far. Mouse will have to leave her frail and elderly Gran to make this trip and asks Tully to look after her Gran. When Amber covers for him one day, she finds a connection to family she had never known, her own grandmother and Mouse’s Gran grew up together and were part of something huge, the Guardians of the Green.

The planet had been destroyed by an evil company, CynGen, and they had formed to try and save the planet. Amber’s role is to find the secret her mother and grandmother hid for her to find and if she hadn’t met Mouse’s Gran, she would never have known to even look! Whilst she is off doing that. Mouse makes her way to DL-1, where Mr P has to send her to another address for the required vitamins. But not being able to read more than a little, Mouse is given something, that instead of saving those who live on DL-6, she has done the Company’s dirty work for them! As Mouse returns and finds many dead, she manages to rescue Tully and just as they want to look for Amber and any other survivors, they hear word of the Company coming down to finish off all those in DL-6, as they had wanted to do long ago! The gems or sparklies Mouse and others use for trade must be very valuable to those at the top and the Company, but they don’t know why. Now they must all run for their lives and Mouse must give them a chance to get away, to make up for her guilt, but with that comes the chance of being captured. A semi cliffhanger appears at the end as Mouse meets up with a woman called Ravenne, another of the characters in this series of prequels setting up for the finale. Another intriguing character in the prequel series and I can’t wait to see how they all fit together and what will happen next. I received an ARC copy of this book form BookSprout and I have freely given my own opinion of the book above.

[Anne Curry · Rating 5 out of 5]

Kept me on edge for what was going to happen next. Mouse and Amber were both very well defined characters. Good plot. Could almost feel being in the depths with them. Good read for dystopian readers.

Betrayed, murder, intrigue, hiding, narrow spaces, loss, hardship, struggle through life, discovering a bit of truth, friendship, caught,.

I received a free copy of this book via Booksprout and am voluntarily leaving a review.

[Kelly Greer · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a page-turning dystopian read! I *really* enjoyed Mouse & Amber's story. I'd even love more stories set here, in the deep levels. (Maybe we'll get more in Hostile Takeover?)

Though this was a novella, I feel like we got a good deal of backstory, a feel for the characters, and more about The Guardians of the Green - just a hint of what's to come. The world-building is also really good for this being such a short book.

There are so many things that I'm looking forward to in the full novella! I can't wait!

If you like futuristic, dystopian stories that will keep you turning the page and waiting for more, this is the book for you!

Merged review:

I loved this glimpse into a dystopian future underground! I was intrigued through the whole book and can't wait for what happens in Hostile Takeover!