Fat Cat

Fat Cat by Robin Brande, Listening Library, 2009 // Knopf Books for Young Readers, 2009

Dear Fat Cat,
You are a delight from page one to the last punctuation mark on the last page!
There is so much to love in your story.

While listening to Kirsten Potter narrate your audiobook version, I had to curb the impulse to snap "Look, I can't talk right now," when I answered the phone.

I had to restrain myself from holding up my hand with an exasperated, "SHUSH!" when people spoke to me.

I was so enthralled in your storytelling that I practically lived with my earphones until the end.

I have now finished it.
It was SPLENDID.

Thank you so much.

BookMoot
Cat is an extremely bright, focused, hard working and academically gifted high schooler. She is also is overweight and candy bar dependent. She wants to win the science fair with every fiber of her being, in large part, so she can beat Matt McKinney, the guy that broke her heart in junior high school.

Her project, to live, as much as possible, like a hominid woman means Cat is walking everywhere instead of riding in a car. It means no computers, no telephone, and eating an approximation of a hominid diet. Before too much time passes, Cat is noting weight loss and improved fitness in her science journal. Her slim and toned figure begins to attract the kind attention from guys that she has never experienced before.

Author, Robin Brande does not stumble nor hit one false note in this story. I loved Cat's family who embraces her project. She has the kind of best friend that everyone yearns for and the project brings her closer to her younger brother. Brande does not quantify the amount of weight that Cat is losing. The focus is on the achievment NOT a specific number of pounds.

I was very intrigued and inspired by the vegetarian blueprint that is offered. Cat begins her new lifestyle under the supervision of a dietitian. She loves to cook and the healthy food she prepares is mouth-watering and savory and delicious. I could almost taste it. I did laugh as her supportive family gives a thumbs down to the tofu turkey at Thanksgiving.

Fat Cat is funny, honest and a sweet romance. This book celebrates families, healthy eating, exercise, friendship, hard work, home cooking, demanding teachers, teenage hormones and first love.

I am telling librarians, friends, relatives who are emailing me for suggestions for gift ideas, even strangers in doctor's waiting rooms about this book and I have it poised for homecoming college kids.

It is simply grand.

48 Hour Book Challenge

Starting a book challenge while packing to leave Washington DC, checking carry-on bags for fluids and gels (forgot to notice the sunscreen) and death marching to the National Gallery while threading our way through 200,000 Girls Scouts enroute to a sing along - "Still Singing after all these Years!" - on the National Mall is dicey at best.

Fun to know Mother Reader herself was somewhere in the vicinity. I wonder if I was packed in next to her in the Smithsonian Metro station? We emerged from our train along with thousands and thousands of Girl Scouts in bright t-shirts. Shouts of "Buddy up, girls!" swelled from the throats of dozens and dozens of leaders and grown-ups trying to count heads and turn their troops in the right direction.

If I was a claustrophobic person, I would have seriously freaked out at the humanity-per-square-inch in that confined space. My main worry was being inadvertently pushed off the edge but we shuffled away from the drop and toward the escalators and slowly ascended towards the surface.

Total number of books read for the challenge: TWO
Total number of pages read for the challenge: 664 pages
Total altitude while reading: 36,000 feet
Number of sore limbs from 6 days of extensive sight-seeing while reading: 4
Number of heavy eyelids from 6 days of extensive sight-seeing while reading: 2
Amount of fun had from 6 days of extensive sight seeing and joy of reading two perfectly wonderful books: Too much to count!


My reading time did not commence until we arrived at Reagan Airport for the flight home.
My first book was the outstanding Skulduggery Pleasant by Derek Landy, 392 pages. I had not finished when the plane landed 2 hours and 40 minutes later but maybe I was the only participant reading at 36,000 feet??

Since it was so late when we got home, I did not finish until the next day. My reaction to this book is to exhort you to run, skip, hop, hasten, or zoom to your nearest book provider and grab it.

Skulduggery Pleasant is part Dashiell Hammett with a stir of Raymond Chandler and shaken well with magic and fantasy. Storyteller Landy has laced the mix with humor and action. This is one of my favorite books this year!

I can hardly wait to read more. I hope Derek Landy is writing away. I love Irish storytellers.


Book 2 on my reading list was Robin Brande's Evolution, Me & Other Freaks of Nature, 272 pages.

In this family we know we have a great book in hand when one of us stops reading and says to everyone present, "Listen to this!" I did that so many times last night, I might as well have read the whole book aloud.

Mena's first day of high school is turning out to be a nightmare. She is shunned by all her former "friends" for something we do not find out about until later in the story. She is enduing verbal and physical assaults and thinks she has lost her parents' love. The chance pairing (or did God have a hand in it?) with her science lab partner, Casey Conner, science genius, is about to change her life though.

Casey is funny and smart and determined to help Mena succeed. I loved his character whole heartedly from the moment he realizes Mena has never read Lord of the Rings.

"So you've read it?"

"Um, no."

"But you have seen the movies."

I sort of winced and shook my head. I need to learn to lie.

Casey closed his eyes and pinched his fingers against them like he had a terrible migraine. "Okay, you realize I'm going to have to do an intervention."

I love this guy.

The background of the story involves the teaching of evolution and the efforts of a fundamentalist church to inject creationism into the classroom. The reader is routing for Mena all the way as she attempts to understand her faith and resolve her relationships with her parents and her community.

The ongoing allusions to Lord of the Rings also delighted this reader.

Travelogue

RRRiordan is blogging from London. He met Amanda Craig of the Times and will be interviewed for BBC by Jacqueline Wilson! Living the Dream! (He will not get to Oxford this time, Michele.)

Meg Cabot is blogging from Paris (and other points) and got to meet Neil Gaiman in Leipzig. Paris is really so beautiful around Easter time. Actually, when is Paris NOT beautiful? Check out the chocolate Easter egg.

Neil Gaiman has been shadowing Meg Cabot and is a "a really cool dad" because MC gave him a stack of her books autographed to his daughter, Mandy.

Robin Brande is back from an author tour and visiting with her readers all across the country. Librarian, Susan Geye at North Crowley High School in Ft. Worth, Texas presented her with the most amazing gift. Read her post to find out what it was. What a terrific idea for visiting authors. Texas librarians are awesome!

Maureen Johnson has returned from London and has an entirely entertaining account, "BRIEF ENCOUTERS WITH FAMOUS PEOPLE." Monday, March 19, 2007, of her flight home with Sigourney Weaver.

Lisa Yee is in Michigan for a school visit and got to meet Jim (Happy Bunny) Benton at a book signing. Earlier in March, she also got to meet Carol Burnett and John Lithgow signed her napkin.

Linda Sue Park has been traveling to Hong Kong and Taiwan and is posting photos.

Grace Lin is back from Hong Kong and brought home a beautifully tailored blue dress.


And finally,

Hopefully, John Green is home from the hospital.

Get well, John.