TABITHA

Timmel tells, in the omniscient third-person, the true story of her cat's disappearance during a flight from New York to Los Angeles. Carol Ann is moving to Los Angeles, and her cat, Tabitha, has to ride with the baggage. When the baggage is unloaded, Tabitha's cage is empty; a bit of a scaredy-cat about other people and large noises, Tabitha has gone into hiding in the walls of the plane. Carol Ann searches for the lost feline, but the plane is so noisy with fuel trucks, mechanics, and vacuum cleaners between flights that Tabitha can't hear anyone calling for her. The plane continues to shuttle back and forth between New York and Los Angeles, but in spite of many searches, Tabitha logs 13 days and over 30,000 miles of flying time before she is found. Timmel does a reasonably good job of characterizing her cat and herself; still, the cat-in-the- bowels-of-the-plane sections are the freshest and most intriguing, in terms of both text and illustrations. Kelly's detailed watercolors ably assist the story and add their own touches of humor. (Picture book. 5-8)