Bad Kitty fans will certainly embrace Puppy’s first outing since Poor Puppy (2007).
Puppy and Uncle Murray escape a rampaging Bad Kitty for a day’s adventure on the town.
Bad Kitty’s acting crazier than usual. Puppy never minds, but Uncle Murray rescues him anyway, and the two go for a walk. Uh-oh! Uncle Murray forgot Puppy’s leash, so he gets a ticket from a police officer. Puppy has to do his business and…Uncle Murray has no bags to clean up—another ticket. Puppy’s collar and tags are at home…another ticket. Poor Uncle Murray! Maybe a trip to the dog park will help. Puppy meets a new friend—in the way puppies do—and when he and Uncle Murray get separated, Puppy ends up in the pound. Will Uncle Murray rescue him? What about Puppy’s new friends? And what of Bad Kitty’s conniption? Bruel lets Bad Kitty’s drooling, happy canine sibling have a tale of his own. As in previous chapter-book–length outings in the series, the story is heavily illustrated and dotted with two-page informational spreads. This time, Bad Kitty takes over Uncle Murray’s lecturing duties to speak on differences in potty habits between cats and dogs and the reasons dogs sniff bottoms. Perhaps it’s not the best of the series, but it offers plenty of good, goofy fun that’s ever-so-slightly instructional.
Bad Kitty fans will certainly embrace Puppy’s first outing since Poor Puppy (2007). (Graphic/fiction hybrid. 8-11)Pub Date: Jan. 6, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-59643-976-4
Page Count: 160
Publisher: Neal Porter/First Second
Review Posted Online: Sept. 30, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2014
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Epic lunacy.
Will extragalactic rats eat the moon?
Can a cybernetic toenail clipper find a worthy purpose in the vast universe? Will the first feline astronaut ever get a slice of pizza? Read on. Reworked from the Live Cartoon series of homespun video shorts released on Instagram in 2020 but retaining that “we’re making this up as we go” quality, the episodic tale begins with the electrifying discovery that our moon is being nibbled away. Off blast one strong, silent, furry hero—“Meow”—and a stowaway robot to our nearest celestial neighbor to hook up with the imperious Queen of the Moon and head toward the dark side, past challenges from pirates on the Sea of Tranquility and a sphinx with a riddle (“It weighs a ton, but floats on air. / It’s bald but has a lot of hair.” The answer? “Meow”). They endure multiple close but frustratingly glancing encounters with pizza and finally deliver the malign, multiheaded Rat King and its toothy armies to a suitable fate. Cue the massive pizza party! Aside from one pirate captain and a general back on Earth, the human and humanoid cast in Harris’ loosely drawn cartoon panels, from the appropriately moon-faced queen on, is light skinned. Merch, music, and the original episodes are available on an associated website.
Epic lunacy. (Graphic science fiction. 8-11)Pub Date: May 10, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-06-308408-7
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Katherine Tegen/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Feb. 8, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2022
SEEN & HEARD
A waggish tale with a serious (and timely) theme.
An age-old rivalry is reluctantly put aside when two young vacationers are lost in the wilderness.
Anthropomorphic—in body if definitely not behavior—Dogg Scout Oscar and pampered Molly Hissleton stray from their separate camps, meet by chance in a trackless magic forest, and almost immediately recognize that their only chance of survival, distasteful as the notion may be, lies in calling a truce. Patterson and Grabenstein really work the notion here that cooperation is better than prejudice founded on ignorance and habit, interspersing explicit exchanges on the topic while casting the squabbling pair with complementary abilities that come out as they face challenges ranging from finding food to escaping such predators as a mountain lion and a pack of vicious “weaselboars.” By the time they cross a wide river (on a raft steered by “Old Jim,” an otter whose homespun utterances are generally cribbed from Mark Twain—an uneasy reference) back to civilization, the two are BFFs. But can that friendship survive the return, with all the social and familial pressures to resume the old enmity? A climactic cage-match–style confrontation before a worked-up multispecies audience provides the answer. In the illustrations (not seen in finished form) López plops wide-eyed animal heads atop clothed, more or less human forms and adds dialogue balloons for punchlines.
A waggish tale with a serious (and timely) theme. (Fantasy. 9-11)Pub Date: April 1, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-316-41156-1
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Jimmy Patterson/Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Dec. 15, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2019
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
