Cat’s adventures don’t qualify as a catastrophe, but neither are they particularly compelling.
An anthropomorphic cat learns about fashion and finds success as a dancer before opening her own Parisian club for cats.
Born “in a narrow, smelly alleyway,” Cat’s origins are squalid at best. Nonetheless she is brimming with self-confidence. Still, her first foray into the performing arts does not go well. Kicked out of a cafe for “caterwauling,” she retreats to a cozy spot in a seamstress’s studio, where she begins creating fanciful clothing. A visit to a nightclub results in a gig co-starring with Josephine Baker and her cheetah. Missing her large family, Cat decides to head home to establish Madame Kitty’s Catacombs Club. The name is one of several feline-oriented puns found sprinkled throughout the text. These puns combine with the sophisticated vocabulary and casual inclusion of legendary artists Edith Piaf and Baker to create an archly adult tone that may limit appeal. Some internal rhymes and occasional alliteration are pleasing but can’t quite compensate for the overlong, overstuffed text. Grobler’s scratchy, atmospheric illustrations, vaguely reminiscent of Maira Kalman’s artwork, offer exaggerated outlines and intriguing textures. The inclusion of vignettes, single-page pictures, and double-page spreads adds interest and helps to move the (somewhat clunky) plot along. An author’s note briskly outlines the lives of Piaf and Baker while endpapers feature an idiosyncratic map of Paris that features pertinent locations and a few landmarks. (This book was reviewed digitally with 11-by-18-inch double-page spreads viewed at 90% of actual size.)
Cat’s adventures don’t qualify as a catastrophe, but neither are they particularly compelling. (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-910328-62-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Tiny Owl
Review Posted Online: June 15, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2020
Hee haw.
The print version of a knee-slapping cumulative ditty.
In the song, Smith meets a donkey on the road. It is three-legged, and so a “wonky donkey” that, on further examination, has but one eye and so is a “winky wonky donkey” with a taste for country music and therefore a “honky-tonky winky wonky donkey,” and so on to a final characterization as a “spunky hanky-panky cranky stinky-dinky lanky honky-tonky winky wonky donkey.” A free musical recording (of this version, anyway—the author’s website hints at an adults-only version of the song) is available from the publisher and elsewhere online. Even though the book has no included soundtrack, the sly, high-spirited, eye patch–sporting donkey that grins, winks, farts, and clumps its way through the song on a prosthetic metal hoof in Cowley’s informal watercolors supplies comical visual flourishes for the silly wordplay. Look for ready guffaws from young audiences, whether read or sung, though those attuned to disability stereotypes may find themselves wincing instead or as well.
Hee haw. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: May 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-545-26124-1
Page Count: 26
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Dec. 28, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An immersive, charming read and convincing proof again that even small bodies can house stout hearts.
Can knightly deeds bring together a feathered odd couple who are on opposite daily schedules?
Having won over a dragon (and millions of fans) in the Caldecott Honor–winning Knight Owl (2022), the fierce yet impossibly cute nocturnal, armor-clad owlet faces a new challenge—sleep deprivation—in the wake of taking on Early Bird, a trainee who rises with the sun and chatters interminably: “I made pancakes! Do you like pancakes? I love pancakes! Where’s the syrup?” It’s enough to test the patience of even the knightliest of owls, and eventually Knight Owl explodes in anger. But although Early Bird is even smaller than her mentor, she turns out to be just as determined to achieve knighthood. After he tells her to leave, she acquits herself so nobly in a climactic encounter with a pack of wolves that she earns a place at the castle. Denise proves a dab hand at depicting genuinely slinky, scary wolves as well as slipping cheerfully anachronistic newspapers and other sight gags into his realistically wrought medieval settings to underscore the tale’s tongue-in-cheek tone. Better yet, a final view of the doughty duo sitting down together to a lavish pancake breakfast/dinner at dusk ends the episode in a sweet rush of syrup and bonhomie.
An immersive, charming read and convincing proof again that even small bodies can house stout hearts. (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: Oct. 15, 2024
ISBN: 9780316564526
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Christy Ottaviano Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 5, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2025
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