4 stories · part of Friendship
Mice stories
The smallest heroes in the library, and some of the bravest
Mice are the smallest heroes in this library, and there are four of their stories here: a mouse council agreeing on a plan, a country mouse visiting town, a little good mouse repaying a kindness, and a cat outwitted. Four to nine minutes each.
Mice are the natural heroes of children's stories because they are the size a child feels. A mouse who outwits a cat, frees a lion or crosses a kitchen floor is doing something enormous, and every listener knows it.
This is a small theme with a big following. The stories are short, warm and funny, and they are ideal for the youngest listeners, who will want the squeaky voice.
Where to start in mice
4 of the 4 stories in this theme, picked as good first choices: the shortest, the gentlest and the best loved.
4 min
Ages 4–8 · Classic Tales
The Mice in Council
Master Mouser calls a council of mice, sparking curiosity throughout their quaint village. As winter approaches, the…
6 min
Ages 3–7 · Classic Tales
The Cat and the Mice
In a peaceful village, happy mice live simple, joyous lives. But when a sleek, cunning cat arrives, he dreams only of…
8 min
Ages 4–8 · Aesop's Fables
The Town Mouse and the Country Mouse
Town Mouse, sleek and city-loving, invites his country pal to experience the city's gourmet delights. Country Mouse is…
9 min
Ages 4–8 · Kindness
The Little Good Mouse
Milo, a kind mouse, lives in a harmonious animal village. When the village's precious cheese supply mysteriously…
All four, and who each one suits
This is a four-story theme, so here is the whole of it rather than a selection.
The two shorter ones
The Mice in Council is four minutes for ages four to eight, and it is a meeting: a roomful of small creatures trying to agree what to do about a large problem. The Cat and the Mice is five minutes and gentle, and it ends somewhere kinder than the title suggests, which makes it safe for a three-year-old.
The two longer ones
The Town Mouse and the Country Mouse is eight minutes, retold from Aesop, and it is the best of the four for a child who has just moved house or visited somewhere very unlike home. The Little Good Mouse is nine minutes and the most adventurous, for ages four to eight.
Why a mouse, and not a rabbit
Storytellers reach for mice when they want the smallest possible hero. A mouse cannot win a fight, so every mouse story has to be solved another way — by talking, by agreeing, by being underestimated, or by having been kind earlier to somebody much larger.
That is a genuinely useful shape for a small child, who spends most of the day being the least powerful person in the room. The Mice in Council makes the point most directly, since nothing in it gets decided by strength.
Voices, if you do them
Mice are the easiest characters in the library to read aloud, because nobody expects a mouse to be loud. A slightly quicker, slightly higher voice is enough, and it has the useful side effect of pulling a child in towards you rather than pushing them awake. Keep the cat in The Cat and the Mice low and slow rather than growled, and the whole story stays inside the register a tired child can follow.
Two country mice, and where to go next
The Aesop fable about the two mice exists twice on this site. The Town Mouse and the Country Mouse sits on this page at eight minutes; The City Mouse and the Country Mouse is a separate seven-minute retelling filed with the other fables. Reading both is a small, easy way to show a child that the same story can be told twice, and the question of which mouse was right is one a five-year-old can genuinely have an opinion about.
Mice branch from friendship, and the nearest theme in spirit is belonging, which is also small and also about not being the biggest thing in the room. For more short animal fables of this length, try Aesop’s fables or the much larger animal stories collection. If your child is three or four and these have gone down well, our guide to bedtime stories for preschoolers suggests what else tends to work at that age.
Every mice story, A to Z
Questions parents ask about mice stories
How many mouse stories are on BedtimeStory.kids?
Four: The Mice in Council, The Cat and the Mice, The Town Mouse and the Country Mouse, and The Little Good Mouse. They take four to nine minutes to read aloud.
Is there a version of the town and country mouse fable here?
Two of them. The Town Mouse and the Country Mouse runs eight minutes, and a separate retelling, The City Mouse and the Country Mouse, runs seven.
Are mouse stories frightening if there is a cat in them?
The Cat and the Mice is marked gentle and ends kindly, so it suits ages three and up. If your child is wary of predators in stories at all, read it first yourself and keep your voice level.
Which mouse story is best for a child who has just moved?
The Town Mouse and the Country Mouse. It is entirely about two places being different and both being somebody's home.