The Toymaker's Apprentice is a Children's Fairy Tale Adventure Book by Sherri L. Smith.
Stefan Drosselmeyer is a young boy from Nuremberg
, Bavaria. Stefan is the reluctant apprentice toy maker to his father, both of whom are now grieving from the recent death of Stefan's mother. On the day of her funeral, he is visited by a previously-unknown cousin of his, clock maker Christian Drosselmeyer, and an Arab man accompanying him named Samir. After spending some time together, Christian decides to make Stefan his apprentice journeyman, since Stefan had apparently decided it was time to strike out on his own.
Ernst Listz is a travelling rat who recently came to the city of Nuremberg looking for money and a place to stay for a couple of days. He makes his living singing songs and taking dictation for other rodents in need of anything that they need written. He's approached by a pie-bald mouse who has a proposition for him: become the teacher for the soon-to-be-born princes of the Mouse Queen who seeks to overthrow the king and queen of Boldavia.
Christian reveals he's a criminal to the country of Boldavia to Stefan. He'd been responsible for keeping Boldavia's mouse and rat population under control, but despite his efforts, the mouse queen managed to infiltrate the palace and bite Pirlipat, the princess of Boldavia, and poison her. Now the princess is turning into a wooden doll, and the only known cure is the krakatook, a nut so rare it might as well not exist. Christian has been tasked with finding the nut and bringing it back, and Samir is to guard and assist him in his quest.
Soon enough, a grand adventure begins.
The book was published on October the 13th, 2015.
The Toymaker's Apprentice contains examples of:
- Clockworks Area: While they're in Nuremberg, Christian shows Stefan the Master Clock of the city, which keeps it running. The Master Clock is so massive that it's located in a gigantic underground room, and is run with gears and pendulums even bigger than people.
- Earn Your Happy Ending: Stefan gets put through the wringer in this book, even before it starts, but he's much happier by the end.
- Faking the Dead: While they're riding a boat down some rapids, a wave washes over the boat, taking Christian with it. The other's assume he's dead until he finally shows himself in Boldavia.
- Forced Transformation:
- Princess Pirlipat was turned into a living doll by the mouse queen biting her.
- The mouse queen later bites Stefan, turning him into another living doll.
- Gratuitous Latin: In chapter 25, the mouse king has Ernst look at a banner she had made. On it reads E. Pluribus Unum., which translates "Out of many, one.".
- It Always Rains at Funerals: The book begins describing the dreariness of the weather, with thick clouds and drizzle, on the day of Stefan's mom's funeral.
- Meaningful Name: To further reference how she wants her sons to conquer all of Boldavia from the humans, the mouse queen gave each of her seven sons the names of human conquerers: Arthur, Hannibal, Charlemagne, Alexander, Genghis, Roland, and Julius.
- Missing Mom: Stefan's mom died before the book starts. The beginning of the book takes place at her funeral.
- Multiple Head Case: The mouse queen's expected seven princes, when they're born, are one single mouse child who has seven heads.
- No "Police" Option: When Stefan gets word that his father was taken prisoner by the mouse queen, his first instinct was to go to the police. Christian shoots that idea down, stating that the police wouldn't believe him if he told them.
- Secret War: Fought between clock makers and mice.
- Shoe Slap: Marie throws one of her slippers at the mouse king in the battle at her family's house. It ends up killing Charlemagne.
- Squashed Flat: How the mouse queen dies when Stefan, by then turned into wood, falls over on her.
- Strange Secret Entrance: Christian shows Stefan a secret elevator in the janitor's closet of the clock maker's guild that takes him under the city of Nuremberg so he can see the Master Clock. The elevator is activated by shutting the door from inside, turning the handle, and then pressing the lock.
- Talking Animal: Animals are capable of speaking each other's languages. Some are even capable of speaking human. Stefan hearing a rat speak to Christian is what gets him in on the plot.
- The Tooth Hurts: In the ceremony to cure Princess Pirlipat, the first candidate, Johan, attempts to crack a walnut inside his mouth. What he cracks instead is one of his teeth, part of which he spits out along with the walnut.
- You Killed My Father: The mouse queen's sons, seeing Stefan fall on their mom and crush her to death, become determined to avange her death by killing Stefan.
