Splat the Cat

by Rob Scotton
HarperCollins 2008

I'm going to open with what was originally my closing paragraph. You can decide whether to read further after that.

Note to Publishers and Art Departments everywhere: you never look like greater fools than when you don't have any faith in your books and feel the need to use cover space for advertising copy. It doesn't matter if it's front or back cover, picture book or YA, the minute you sell off the book's real estate you have admitted a lack of confidence and a savvy buying public can smell your desperation.

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The National Lampoon, in its heyday back in the late 1970s, used to have a feature in its Photo Funnies section called "Worlds God Never Made," or something similar. Readers would send in snapshots of various businesses that had the word 'world" somewhere in its name, like Chemical World or World of Chicken. It would never cease to amaze me how many people thought they were being clever by naming their business something-world when in fact, the reach and influence of their world scarcely reached across the city limits.

Over time, though, the humor wanes. In a world full of worlds, the idea of yet another world with it's cheap-o plastic yellow sign (always yellow) and its flickering fluorescent bulbs has lost as much of its humorous capital as it does its ginormous placement in the pantheon of large businesses.

Equally, I find that books or movies that lay claim to being "the next (fill in the blank)" or "from the bestselling author of..." are generally trying to sell me the idea that the creator's previous efforts were something so great that I would blindly take on their next creation as brilliant with nary a second thought to its quality. Oddly, in a majority of these cases, I am being sold a familiarity with some other object or product I only know of by reputation. "From the producers of..." tacked at the beginning of a movie title I did not see as a way of proving the pedigree of a another movie I probably won't see is only designed to wedge me into catching the more recent film out of a sense of consumer guilt. Well, I missed that last one, and the ads said it was good, so maybe I better see this one to find out what all the fuss is about. In the end, with so much out there laying claim to some measure of quality we're supposed to all fall in line with -- is there a cultural consensus about anything in this country anymore? -- the idea of quality by association might as well have the word 'world' tacked onto it.

From the director of Psycho comes Frenzy World!

It extends into the world of children's books, and with Splat the Cat I find myself not liking it even before I open the damn thing. Right there under the author's name, on the cover of a book intended for pre-school and pre-reading children are the words "Bestselling Author of Russell the Sheep and Russell and the Lost Treasure." Well, with a one-two combination like that we might just be talking about the next book to top the bestseller list for several months running.

Except we're not.

There's a world of people out there who, surely, this sort of thing must work for. But why? Is it that they loved Russell the Sheep so much but couldn't be bothered to remember the author's name? Could it be that in a world where chain bookstores don't bother to train their staff to handsell children's books that publishers must turn their covers into advertisements for themselves? No kid is going to be sold by this tag line (and if they are then there's something unfortunate about that child's upbringing) and no adult making an informed, conscientious decision about buying a child a book is going to be sold by this attempt to cash in on another set of titles.

After all, if the book cannot sell itself, there's already a problem.

I suppose I ought to actually talk about the book now. The only problem is that everything I've discussed is far more interesting.

Splat is a stand-in for every kid nervous about his first day of school. Splat resists going, comes up with every excuse he can think of to keep from going, finds himself in a class full of new cat friends, and in the end can't wait to go back the next day. That's it in a catnap. Owning a pet mouse, and bringing it to school in his lunch for security, poses the possibility for tension when the teacher informs them that chasing mice is what cats do. But all is diffused when the mouse helps them get to their milk locked in the closet.

Bestselling author of Russell the Sheep? Bestselling? Really? This is supposed to convince me that my thoughts of mediocrity are somehow wrong or misplaced?

I think more than anything what turns me off the most is how much the artwork reminds me of the sort of thing normally found on one of the "edgier" imprints at Hallmark Cards. You know, slick and stylized and not cute little bunnies or soft-focus flowers, art only in the sense of being very workmanlike. There's a sterility to it that makes me feel certain that, if properly shredded, it would prevent a litter box from smelling for weeks.

It's sad when a book causes me to worry about the precious resources being used in its creation. When I start thinking I should go out and plant a replacement tree I get a more than a little disheartened with publishing. A picture book shouldn't make me feel this way; this book does.

Baker Cat

by Posy Simmonds
Red Fox / Random House 2004

A mean old baker and his lazy wife have a cat who literally does everything for them. He sweeps, he peels, he slices, he mixes, he rolls, he ices, he bakes, he does the washing up, and at the end of the day is sent exhausted into the storeroom and told he has to ear his keep by catching mice. Exhausted, the poor marmalade tabby collapses while the mice have their way.

The mice take pity on Baker Cat and strike a bargain: if Baker Cat promises to leave them alone they'll get the baker to leave him alone. The plan involves spinning yarn to look like mouse tails, trophies of his night's work that the baker uses as a gauge to determine how much to reluctantly feed him.

And for a while it works, until the free reign of the mice depletes the larder and the baker threatens to turn Baker Cat into fur gloves if he can't make meringues and tarts appear by morning. Again, it's the mice to the rescue, and the next morning they have set a trap to make the shop look infested by all sorts of vermin. Fed up, the mean baker and his lazy wife ditch the shop, leaving it for Baker Cat and the mice to manage on their own, free of human oppression.

So many questions!

First, if the cat is this accomplished, why doesn't he go into business for himself? Oh, that's right. He's a cat. But then, he's already dealing with customers and working the kitchen so clearly he has some extra-feline skills. Perhaps it's an opposeable thumb. Is it because he needs humans to get the supplies? Well, the mice are excellent thieves, so that takes care of that.

You know, I like this. I'm not looking to tear it apart, but it's so... odd. It's odd in a way I can only call British but without support. It's from that part of the country where the world of nursury rhymes still live, where people possess animals as slaves as well as pets. It isn't alarming or distressing that there is a cat wearing an apron pushing a broom across the shop floor, it appears folks rather expect it. No one seems concerned with cat hairs on their breads - they probably have hairier food in their cottages just down the lane.

But here's another thing: Baker Cat is a passive protagonist. Baker Cat works, Baker Cat suffers, and in the end is too exhausted to do anything about it. Okay, you say, Cinderella didn't exactly make her own dress or conjure her own ride to the ball. Ah, but she had a dream, a desire, and in her longing she was provided for. Not Baker Cat, he just waits until the mice rescue him. And rescue him. And after the mice have twice rescued him he is rewarded for his lack of efforts by gaining a store that the mice help run. It's like a cross between The Cinder Girl and The Shoemaker and the Elves, but with animals, and with less ambition. Baker Cat may not be mean like his former owner, but he sure is lazy.

At least Baker Cat and the mice live in harmony, and the mean and lazy are vanquished.

Simmonds is a cartoon artist, and there are elements of her cartoon work present here. Spreads in the picture book alternate between full page illustration and smaller, panel-free progressions across the page. She has an engaging style slightly reminiscent of Raymond Briggs crossed with William Steig. I came across his while looking up her graphic novel Gemma Bovary and I have to say I preferred this quite a bit.

* * * * *

Why I didn't think of this before I'll never know, but here on out I'm going to try and link the cover to someplace where you can purchase the book at hand. I'm not out to necessarily shovel business for gain, I'm only thinking that maybe I could save folks some time if they're interested.

Alistair and Kip's Great Adventure!

by John Segal!
McElderry Books! 2008!

"Let's build a boat and travel to distant lands," says Alistair. And so they do.

Alistair cat and Kip the dog build themselves a boat and sail down river, into the bay, onto the open seas. A storm comes up, the waves crash their boat into a whale who saves them and takes them home.

"Tomorrow, let's build a plane."

The end.

The journey is a time-honored device in literature, all literature, but usually there is something transformative in the process. The dangers and desires of a journey have to have a purpose, otherwise what's the point? The Bard of Manchester once provided one of the most succinct examples of the power of journey

I was looking for a job, and then I found a job,
And heaven knows I'm miserable now.

See, the main character sets out to do something, and then he accomplishes what he set out to do, and his life has been transformed as a result. No such enlightenment here for Alistair and Kip as they merely come home determined to do the next day what they did the day before. Might as well have a story about a turtle and a donkey who go to the grocery store, eat what they bought, then plan to go to the store the next day.

Let me look at this story again, maybe I'm missing something. Do they have a magical adventure, something beyond the pale? No, they do not. You might be tempted to believe that their interaction with the whale is something, but in order for that to be the case you would have to marvel at a cat and dog's ability to build a boat and sail the ocean. But when dealing with anthropomorphic animals that stand in for humans we aren't supposed to be surprised at their abilities any more than we would stare at stranger in public adjusting their socks. Talking animals would expect nothing less from another -- the whale in this case -- than sympathy and understanding, unless it had been established in advance that whales were something to fear on their grand journey.

Do they glean anything from their experience? That whales are nice, perhaps, but is that the sum of their adventure? No, I don't find a great adventure here. Some nice watercolor work, totally ruined by variable type sizes throughout. That's about it.

I guess my problem is that I'm seeing a lot of books this season that all seem as limp as this, a story that could have been concocted by a small child. Wait, I take that back, I've heard small children tell much more involved stories. These would be the same children a simple book like this would be aimed at. So if kids are capable of longer stories why are the shelves filled with so many empty calories?

Sometimes I wonder if picture books aren't going to cause the demise of picture books.

Clarence the Copy Cat

by Patricia Lakin
Illustrated by John Manders
Dragonfly/Random House 2007
paperback

Clarence the cat comes from a long line of proud mousers, but Clarence refuses to carry on the family business. Shamed and shunned his reputation precedes him as he is sent from restaurant and deli, rejected for failing to live up to the expectations others have of a cat with his lineage.

One day Clarence finds himself on the stoop of a building where instead of being sent away he is brought inside. The building is quiet and filled with books: Clarence has been adopted by a library! Fascinated by his new surroundings Clarence spends his days perched atop the copy machine watching people come and go, gaining the name Copy Cat in the process.

Things seem to be going well until the day a mouse appears. Panicked that he may have lost his new home Clarence attempts to prevent the mouse from returning by using library books to block mouse holes along the baseboards. "Mice eat paper, you know," Clarence's new owner reports and it's only a matter of time before Clarence fears he'll be back out on the street.

Then, as a mouse is scurries across the floor causing havoc in the library, Clarence finds himself unable to get any traction on the glass top of the copy machine while blinding lights flash in his eyes. After it appears that the mouse has finally vacated the premises Clarence discovers that all those lights were the copy machine making larger-than-life prints of his frightening face, and those images fell to the floor under the machine where they surely scared off any mice who might have entertained entering the library.

It's a happy ending for all as Clarence takes up his spot in the sunny window at the library, finally at home.

Yeah, I like this. And 90% of why I like this is because of the illustrations. Manders illustrates with a verve in his lines and humor in the expressive movement of his characters. There is a looseness in his style but it doesn't come across as sloppy or unfinished. I couldn't help but feel like this is the sort of book an animator would draw in his time off a la Bill Peet, though I found no information on Manders having ever worked in cartoons. He's illustrated over a dozen titles and written none of them, which sort of makes me glad because I would hate to discover that he was another illustrator who needed to be filed in the "better seen and not heard" category.

What about Lakin's story? Serviceable. I think the copy machine solution is clumsy at best and we never really understand whether Clarence is afraid of mice or doesn't believe in harming other living things, which makes him just shy of endearing. Kudos to the editor who matched Manders up with Lakin because I think this book was made entirely in the illustrations, by the lines rather than between them.