Goose on the Loose

A modern day fable, Goose! tells the tale of Randall, a neurotic talking goose, who is kidnapped by Congreve Maddox, the principal of the local elementary school. Maddox plans to fatten up Randall so that he can cook the bird and enter him in a culinary contest in Banff, Canada. But Randall has a savior in eleven-year-old Will Donnelly, a sweet and sensitive boy who stopped speaking after the death of his mother. Will and Randall meet and immediately become best friends - they share a love of butterscotch candies and rude noises. With Randall's help (the goose does consider himself the Sigmund Freud of the goose world), Will begins talking again. Will then becomes determined to prevent his pal from ending up as a side of foie gras. Together with his sister, Emily, and some classmates, Will hatches a plot: They'll kidnap Congreve's mother and arrange a hostage exchange for the goose.