We Can't All Be Rattlesnakes

I am a snake.

No, not a rattlesnake. I just look like one. I'm a gopher snake.

One day an oily, filthy, fleshy human child crossed my path. As luck would have it, he knew the difference between a gopher snake and a rattlesnake. He has imprisoned me in a terratium. His name is Gunnar. He calls me Crusher. He thinks I'm male. I'm not.

He dropped in a dead mouse and hoped I'd eat it. I buried it. He then dropped in a live one, which he called "Breakfast." I didn't lay a coil on it.

Gunnar thinks I'll be his adoring pet. He's wrong.

In fact, I am planning my escape. I may take Breakfast with me.

Crusher will charm readers in this entertaining, clever novel about a snake in captivity and how she turns the tables on her human captor.

The New York Times - Julie Just

[Crusher's] seen-it-all voice, and the twists and turns of Jennings's plot, make for an engaging and very funny story.

Patrick Jennings grew up in a small town in Indiana, where there were no wild, lethally venomous snakes. He then lived in rural Arizona, where they were many, including seventeen varieties of rattlesnake. As an adult, he decided to confront his fears and learn more about the creatures. The more he learned, the more he came to hold snakes in high regard, and he even held some of them in his own hands. He introduced live snakes to groups of children, allowing them to touch them, hoping to prevent new generations from misunderstanding—and therefore, fearing—snakes as he did. Even after all this, however, Patrick is still seriously creeped out by the reptiles. He now lives in Washington State, where there are no wild, lethally venomous snakes.

We Can't All Be Rattlesnakes is his fourteenth book for young readers.