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Wish I’d liked this one better. It’s very dismal. Two overlapping stories- one about an abandoned cat that takes shelter under a dilapidated porch with an old hound dog. The dog has been chained there for years by an abusive man who alternately starves and beats him. This miserable man escaped a brutal childhood (treated badly by one parent, abandoned by the other), and lived for decades alone near a dark bayou- his one ambition seems to be bagging an enormous ancient alligator. To prove something to himself. So the cat has kittens, and they are warned to stay hidden under the house where it’s safe, or the man might use them for alligator bait. But of course growing kittens eventually have to explore and push at boundaries. And then bad things start to happen, one after the other. I’ll be frank- one of the animals dies. A kitten finds himself lost and struggling to return home, and meanwhle an ancient malevolent half-human, half-serpent being lurks, waiting to wreak some revenge. That’s the other storyline.
I liked the parts about the cats, and the poor dog, even though so many dark trials happened to them. (Kinda like the foxes). I didn’t at all like Gar Face and the alligator- though they felt important to the story. The thousand-years-ago telling of the lamia being and how she lost her daughter and why she seethed with anger for so many years, felt more like a fable. And of course they all weave together in the end- I knew all these ‘bad guys’ would cause calamity to each other- I didn’t expect one of them to suddenly be moved with emotion upon seeing the bond of caring the kittens had, and have a complete change of heart. It felt too abrupt.
The pictures (few) are great. The prose is somewhat tiresome. Very short chapters (most just half a page, if that), very repetitive language, and enough inaccuracies (I’m pretty sure beautyberry and sumac are shrubs not trees) that it bothered me. Also descriptive phrases like “the goldy sun” and “greenly” something got on my nerves after a while. I’m glad I read it, but I don’t know if I’ll be interested in reading any more by this author.
Borrowed from the public library. Completed on 4/17/24.
2 Responses
I was curious if this was maybe a really old book (which would explain a lot of the issues) so I looked it up. A line from one of the reviews gave me a laugh. “overly florid prose (think Hemingway geared toward kids)”.
It’s interesting how intensely split the reviews on Goodreads are. Everything is either 5 or 1 star, “best book ever!” or “worst book ever!”, no popular “meh, it was fine” kind of reviews.
Anyway, I think this is a big pass for me for multiple reasons. I’m usually avoid books with animal abuse as much as I can.
Yep. Apparently some people really like the style. Or the message. The more I think about it, I suppose the man’s miserable personality was the reaction to his awful upbringing, but yet the kittens and dog by contrast, even though treated badly, stayed decent and caring and supporting of each other. And the ancient snake-woman felt abandoned and betrayed and sat on her grudge for (literally) centuries, so that was another example of how bad feeling could fester…
But I totally agree, avoid this one if you can’t stand reading about cruelty to animals. It’s so much, I really question why this is shelved in juvenile fiction, I think a lot of children would have problems handling this book. Or be really upset by it.