Rascal (book)

Rascal: A Memoir of a Better Era, often referred to as Rascal, is a 1963 children's book by Sterling North about his childhood in Wisconsin.

Rascal was published in 1963. The book is a remembrance of a year in his childhood during which he raised a baby raccoon named "Rascal".

Subtitled "a memoir of a better era", North's book is about adolescent angst. Rascal chronicles young Sterling's loving yet distant relationship with his father, dreamer David Willard North, and the aching loss represented by the death of his mother, Elizabeth Nelson North. (The book also touches on young Sterling's concerns for his older brother Herschel, off fighting in World War I in Europe.) The boy reconnects with society through the unlikely intervention of his pet raccoon, a "ringtailed wonder" charmer. The book begins with the capture of the baby raccoon, and follows his growth to a yearling.

The story is also a personal chronicle of the era of change between the (nearly) untouched forest wilderness and agriculture; between the days of the pioneers and the rise of towns; and between horse-drawn transportation and automobiles, among other transitions. The author recounts through the eyes of himself as a boy his observations during expeditions in and around his home town, contrasted with his father's reminiscences of the time "when Wisconsin was still half wilderness, when panthers sometimes looked in through the windows, and the whippoorwills called all night long", provide a glimpse of the past, as the original subtitle suggests.

The book has humorous moments. His sister Theo cannot understand Sterling's building of a canoe in the living room and is "startled nearly out of her wits" when Rascal, who had been lying on and blending into Uncle Justus' Amazonian jaguar rug, stands up. Later in the book, Rascal joins him in a pie eating contest, and they win, but are disqualified, although his friend, Oscar Sunderland, takes first prize because of it. Rascal also enjoyed riding in his bicycle's basket, and helped him sell magazines by creating an animated sideshow.

The book also has serious moments. The author's brother, Herschel, is serving in the military during World War I, and Sterling longs for a word from him. Rascal is confined after he bites Slammy Stillman for snapping him with a rubber band. Later, Sterling catches a mild case of the Spanish flu during the epidemic. (The book states his Aunt Lillie, caring for him during his sickness, said Sterling's mother had wanted him to be a writer, which he achieved.)

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