waiter, waiter! more rats in my books!
emphasis on “in”. sister list to ‘absolutely rat-tastic’! for this list, rats do not have to be mentioned in the title, but they MUST be mentioned in the book, featured on the cover, or both! suggestions are extremely welcome🐀
created by shanethe_readingrat
last updated August, 2026
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how prominently does the rat have to be featured in the book? Because City of Bones has a very memorable rat scene. Rats are not central to the plot but that scene lives in my mind
also all of Fruits Basket (one of the characters is a rat occasionally)
oh and the entire Gregor the Overlander series has rats!
and also I remember a book I read as a child in which the main character has a pet rat. or wants a pet rat? I don’t remember anything else about the book, but I thought that was very cool. I love rats 🐀 will come back with the title/more info if I ever remember
Gregor the Overlander!! I haven’t heard that name in forever. makes me want to reread the series
I haven’t reread them since I was like 11 because I’m scared they won’t hold up 🫣 but the urge is always there ahh
this is a pretty fast and loose definition, but basically any book featuring a scene with a rat involved in it or more discussion of rats than just them being mentioned in a passing sentence would count! i'm not reading these before adding them to the list, so this is an honor system "this book totally definitely has rats" sort of thing
love the important work you’re doing for the rat lover community here 🫶
if i could go back in time and tell 16 year old me "hey thanks to picking a rat-related username for your storygraph, in 4 years you're going to be making extremely specific rat-themed lists on an app called Pagebound for your internet friends to see. also Pagebound doesn't exist yet" he would've been like "hey what the fuck are you talking about"
We fully support your ratto character arc.
i was OBSESSED with city of bones when i read it, i was convinced it was the finest literature. how did i forget about the rat scene, im literally cackling. feeling like i need to go steal it from my sisters bookshelf
that scene not being in the movie was legitimately my biggest critique. WHAT were they thinking, that was the best scene of all time 😭
i was also very very obsessed with the whole universe ahh I even did a book report on the first book in 6th grade 🫣🤣
omg the book report, i love that🤩
it’s honestly the weirdest series and i love it so much. by the last few books i was like this series just needs to end, and it took me a year to read city of heavenly fire (i read it off and on throughout the whole year lol) but i did it!
all credit goes to @Lurdo for the idea of this list! they also made two extremely helpful shelves of books that feature/mention rats🐀
Loving the title! I now want to find out if there's a novelisation of Ratatouille...
ty! if there’s a Ratatouille novelization it will get added to this list with the utmost speed
We Could Be Rats by Emily Austin immediately came to mind
literally scrolled down and saw your rat-title list with this book, you got me covered!
haven't read it yet so idk if rats are in more of the book than just the title, but if they are lmk and i'll add it to this list too!
Malcolm at Midnight is a middle-grade about a rat. The main character is a rat who is so small people mistake him for a mouse. He has lots of adventures and has to learn to accept himself for who he is and use his unique rat-talents to save the day. The book has lots of facts about differences between rats and mice.
It was also influential in my daughter getting a rat for her first pet and naming him Malcolm after the character. 💕
officially added🫡
There's a book I read once as a kid called Emmy and the Incredible Shrinking Rat? I think that's what it was called 😂 if it fits better on "absolutely rat-tastic" that's fine. Idk why but this is making me think about the ratshaker game
