bookshelf

JAMES HERRIOT'S CAT STORIES

Name: JAMES HERRIOT'S CAT STORIES
Author: James Herriot
ISBN: 0-312-11342-0

by James Herriot ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 12, 1994

bookshelf

A delightful litter of cat stories from the master storyteller of North Yorkshire. Herriot (Every Living Thing, 1992, etc.) is now retired after 50-plus years of practicing veterinary medicine, primarily with farm animals. While, especially before WW II, country vets rarely treated house pets, Herriot was an exception. Over the years, he not only treated a wide range of feline ailments but met and befriended many colorful and devoted cat owners—and these stories are as much about them as about the animals. There's Mr. Ireson, an eccentric world traveler and lover of poetry who lives in a makeshift tarpaulin house with petite little Emily, his cat whom Herriot saves from a difficult delivery with an emergency caesarean. When visiting a farm to tend to a cow's overgrown hooves, Herriot finds a tiny black kitten outside in freezing weather. The kitten is soon adopted (and nursed) by a foster mother—a sow with twelve piglets. And there's Olly and Ginny, two completely wild strays who adopt the Herriots at their later home in Hannerly, living for years in the backyard and ever so slowly learning to trust humans. (The day Ginny presses her nose against Herriot's was, he says, one of his ``greatest triumphs.'') And, most touchingly, there's the tale of Debbie, a stray who frequently visits the plush home of Mrs. Ainsworth, where she's fed and allowed to sit by the warm fire but stays for only a precious few minutes each time—but where, with her dying breath, she brings her tiny kitten on Christmas Day. A must for Herriot followers and cat lovers alike; the only disappointment may be that this slim volume simply reads too fast. Short, but oh, so sweet. (Color illustrations, not seen) (First printing of 850,000; Literary Guild selection; $500,000 ad/promo)

Pub Date: Sept. 12, 1994

ISBN: 0-312-11342-0

Page Count: 176

Publisher: St. Martin's

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1994

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
JAMES HERRIOT'S ANIMAL STORIES
by James Herriot

- BOOK REVIEW
EVERY LIVING THING
by James Herriot

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR. AND THE MARCH ON WASHINGTON

bookshelf

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR. AND THE MARCH ON WASHINGTON

by Frances E. Ruffin & edited by Stephen Marchesi ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 1, 2001

bookshelf

This early reader is an excellent introduction to the March on Washington in 1963 and the important role in the march played by Martin Luther King Jr. Ruffin gives the book a good, dramatic start: “August 28, 1963. It is a hot summer day in Washington, D.C. More than 250,00 people are pouring into the city.” They have come to protest the treatment of African-Americans here in the US. With stirring original artwork mixed with photographs of the events (and the segregationist policies in the South, such as separate drinking fountains and entrances to public buildings), Ruffin writes of how an end to slavery didn’t mark true equality and that these rights had to be fought for—through marches and sit-ins and words, particularly those of Dr. King, and particularly on that fateful day in Washington. Within a year the Civil Rights Act of 1964 had been passed: “It does not change everything. But it is a beginning.” Lots of visual cues will help new readers through the fairly simple text, but it is the power of the story that will keep them turning the pages. (Easy reader. 6-8)

Pub Date: Jan. 1, 2001

ISBN: 0-448-42421-5

Page Count: 48

Publisher: Grosset & Dunlap

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2000

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

bookshelf

DRESS YOUR FAMILY IN CORDUROY AND DENIM

by David Sedaris ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 1, 2004

Sedaris’s sense of life’s absurdity is on full, fine display, as is his emotional body armor. Fortunately, he has plenty of...

bookshelf

Known for his self-deprecating wit and the harmlessly eccentric antics of his family, Sedaris (Me Talk Pretty One Day, 2000, etc.) can also pinch until it hurts in this collection of autobiographical vignettes.

Once again we are treated to the author’s gift for deadpan humor, especially when poking fun at his family and neighbors. He draws some of the material from his youth, like the portrait of the folks across the street who didn’t own a TV (“What must it be like to be so ignorant and alone?” he wonders) and went trick-or-treating on November first. Or the story of the time his mother, after a fifth snow day in a row, chucked all the Sedaris kids out the door and locked it. To get back in, the older kids devised a plan wherein the youngest, affection-hungry Tiffany, would be hit by a car: “Her eagerness to please is absolute and naked. When we ask her to lie in the middle of the street, her only question was ‘Where?’ ” Some of the tales cover more recent incidents, such as his sister’s retrieval of a turkey from a garbage can; when Sedaris beards her about it, she responds, “Listen to you. If it didn’t come from Balducci’s, if it wasn’t raised on polenta and wild baby acorns, it has to be dangerous.” But family members’ square-peggedness is more than a little pathetic, and the fact that they are fodder for his stories doesn’t sit easy with Sedaris. He’ll quip, “Your life, your privacy, your occasional sorrow—it’s not like you're going to do anything with it,” as guilt pokes its nose around the corner of the page. Then he’ll hitch himself up and lacerate them once again, but not without affection even when the sting is strongest. Besides, his favorite target is himself: his obsessive-compulsiveness and his own membership in this company of oddfellows.

Sedaris’s sense of life’s absurdity is on full, fine display, as is his emotional body armor. Fortunately, he has plenty of both.