This was a delightful rhyming tale that took about 10 minutes to read, even with savoring the illustrations. The Queen loves her cats, (both the sweet ones and the brats!), but the King isn't so keen. The cats try to make him love them, but finally he finds the solution himself, and everybody's happy. The illustrations are not quite so lush as in Sanderson's Papa Gatto, but they are full of cattiness, just the same. ( )

Summary: This story is about a Queen who has many, many cats. The Queen loves them but the cats feel as if the King doesn't like them as much as they like him. So they try their best to win his affection. In the end, the King gets a dog who ends up becoming friends with the cats, and they decide the King must love them afterall since he got them a dog as a new friend.

Critique of Genre: Fantasy, because the story is being told from the point of view of all the cats in the house and animals can't actually talk or have feelings about being well-liked.

Age: Primary

Media: Does not specify ( )

I *loved* this one--story, text, pictures, all of it--about a prince who finds himself at odds with his wife's love of the dozens of cats she's invited into their castle. ( )

Fun rhyming story with great illustrations. ( )

So the Queen has filled their castle with cats and the King isn't too thrilled about the situation. The cats attempt to show the King how much they love him with gifts (like a dead mouse in his shoe) and personalized artwork (scratches on the walls in the shape of a cat), but the King is not easily won over. Then the King takes matters into this own hands and brings home a dog. A big horse of a dog, too; it looked like a boarhound or mastiff. And, as per usual, the cats interpret the dog as a gift from the King to show how much he does in fact love the cats.

Loved it from start to finish!!! This was my first Sanderson and I plan to read more of her books at my earliest opportunity.

5 stars (and added to my buy list)

EDITED: Correction. This was NOT my first Sanderson. After reading through her 1975-1983 page I discovered that she illustrated The Store-Bought Doll, one of my favorite books when I was a little girl. How cool is that?!! I love re-discovering childhood loves in my adult years. I still have my original copy too, which I read to my daughter when she was little. It's now saved in my daughter's "special stuff" box to read to / gift to her kid(s) someday. ( )