This image is the cover for the book Elect H. Mouse State Judge

Elect H. Mouse State Judge

A terrible crime occurs in Elect H. Mouse State Judge.
Two young girl are abducted and held hostage by a band of religious fanatics. The girls' anxious father, a politician on the eve of an important election, has reasons of his own not to go to the police, so he hires a pair of shady private eyes to investigate. All the elements of a classic noir—except that the kidnapped girls are mice, the abductors are Sunshine Family dolls, and the detectives are Barbie and Ken.
Part 1970s childhood dreamscape, part Raymond Chandler, this is a world both familiar and transformed. Sex shops, illicit affairs, spies, political hypocrisy, and dangerous zealots may coexist with Barbie and Ken's acrobatic poolside sex, but the crises of faith that Nelly Reifler's characters face are as real as our own. Elect H. Mouse State Judge is an unusual—and masterful—blend of irony and tenderness, and a moving portrayal of a father trying and failing to do the right thing.

Nelly Reifler

Nelly Reifler is the author of See Through, a collection of short stories. Her stories have appeared in publications such as McSweeney's, BOMB, Nerve, jubilat, and The Milan Review, and have been anthologized in books including Lost Tribe: Jewish Fiction from the Edge and FOUND magazine's Requiem for a Paper Bag. She teaches at Sarah Lawrence College and the Pratt Institute, and she is an editor at Post Road. She lives in Saugerties, New York.

Farrar, Straus and Giroux