History Literature / TalesFromDimwoodForest

* Action Girl: Poppy learns to defend herself from much larger opponents by using weapons (namely Ereth's shed quills).

* Badass Adorable: Poppy is a [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peromyscus deer mouse]], making her cute by default. By the end of the first book, she also fights a great horned owl and wins, a feat that from her perspective would not be far off from slaying a dragon.

%%zce* Action Girl: Poppy becomes one.

%%zce* Badass Adorable: Poppy.

* SuddenSequelDeathSyndrome: [[spoiler:Rye]] in ''Poppy and Ereth''.

* ThemeNaming: The forest mice tend to be named after plants, whereas the city mice are named after car parts.

* CallForward: In Ragweed, the titular mouse is told that Dimwood Forest is a nice place, but he should look out for owls. It's noted that he wasn't paying attention.

* ActionGirl: Poppy becomes one.

* BadassAdorable: Poppy.

* FiveManBand: In ''Ragweed'':
--> TheLeader: Ragweed
--> TheLancer: Clutch
--> TheSmartGuy: Blinker
--> TheBigGuy: Dipstick
--> TheHeart: Lugnut
** In particular, Clutch, Lugnut, and Dipstick form an ''actual'' band, with Clutch on guitar and Dipstick on drums.

* PricklyPorcupine: Ereth. Mr. Ocax told Poppy's family that porcupines were vicious predators who used their quills to eviscerate their prey as a means of controlling them in the first book, but Poppy discovered that wasn't true after meeting Ereth.

* SeldomSeenSpecies: Golden mice, grasshopper mice, pygmy mice, and fishers.

* PricklyPorcupine: Ereth.

* ''Ragweed'' (1999)

The series starts with ''Poppy'', telling of the titular character and her family's troubles with the owl Mr. Ocax. After Ocax kills her fiance Ragweed, Poppy embarks on a quest to keep her family safe, befriending a porcupine named Ereth and freeing the forest of Mr. Ocax's extortionary reign in the process.

!!! Tropes found in ''Tales From Dimwood Forest'':

* ItsAllAboutMe: Ereth often comes off as this and often has thoughts and rants that reinforce it, even despite his friendship with Poppy and his helping her and her loved ones out. This really takes off when he derails the plan for a eulogy at Poppy's funeral by making his remarks about her … quite blatantly about ''himself''; of course, on his part, it could be a grief coping mechanism.

* AnimalJingoism: Some of the predators hold speciesist prejudices against mice as a secondary or supporting reason for killing or eating them; Silversides the cat, for one, hates mice for their habits, boldness, and the way they've—in her view—come to "own" the city (and even the human house) she grew up in. It's to this end she and Graybar form a Klan-esque duo to terrorise and kill as many city mice as they can manage.

** [[spoiler:Ragweed's earring]] in ''Poppy and Ereth''.

** The block of salt in ''Poppy''.

** Then there's Ereth, of course; while he's already curmudgeonly towards nearly everyone, he particularly despises hunters and predators, the fox kits he ends up babysitting being a rare exception.

* AnimalJingoism:
** Some of the predators hold speciesist prejudices against mice as a secondary or supporting reason for killing or eating them; Silversides the cat, for one, hates mice for their habits, boldness, and the way they've—in her view—come to "own" the city (and even the human house) she grew up in. It's to this end she and Graybar form a Klan-esque duo to terrorise and kill as many city mice as they can manage.
** XenophobicHerbivore: Said speciesism is not limited to the predators however, as Lungwort's ill-informed, irrational, hatred or fear of porcupines as supposed quill-shooting mouse-eaters also attests.

* FantasticRacism:
** Some of the predators hold this against mice as a secondary or supporting reason for killing or eating them; Silversides the cat, for one, hates mice for their habits, boldness, and the way they've—in her view—come to "own" the city (and even the human house) she grew up in. It's to this end she and Graybar form a Klan-esque duo to terrorise and kill as many city mice as they can manage.
** It's not limited to the predators however, as Lungwort's ill-informed, irrational, hatred or fear of porcupines as supposed quill-shooting mouse-eaters also attests.