My Very Own Special Particular Private and Personal Cat had me at the title. With a title like this–long, exaggerated, and with alliteration–meant this was either a lost Monty Python bit or a kids book. It is the latter, but since this is a 2023 reprint of a 1963 picture book, there’s more overlap in time than I had known.
I picked it up because Remy Charlip illustrated it, and Charlip is one of my recent favorites. (See my discussion of Fortunately and Dress Up and Let’s Have a Party for more on Charlip.) One thing I like about Charlip’s illustration is his use of space, and that’s definitely visible here. Images and text are arranged on the pages well; the distance between images on two adjacent pages is both visually appealing and meaningful, and it matters when images spill off the page,
Author Sandol Stoddard Warburg tells a surprisingly complex story skillfully. It starts simply, both conceptually and linguistically, with short lines, repetitions, and explanations: it is a story about a kid and his cat. However, as he plays with the cat, he finds that he’s asking too much, and forcing the beloved cat to play along in ways it doesn’t want to. It runs away, leading to anger, then the cat explaining what it is and what it wants. This leads to the boy also stating who he is and what he wants/likes. That leads to a richer negotiated relationship.
And there are lots of pictures of cats being cats.
