Review by Booklist Review
On the front endpapers, the moon illuminates a broad, tree-lined canal separating the city on one side from the fields on the other. Within this picture book, paired pictures illustrate the story in two settings. A white cat lies on a girl's bed in a city apartment, and a striped cat lies on a boy's bed in a country house. While the city cat watches trucks rolling by, the country cat walks among pigs and ducks. Both cats chase mice until a thunderstorm sends all the animals running for shelter. The back endpapers show the sun rising over the canal. Painted in acrylics, the moonlit scenes are sophisticated yet accessible. The rhyme and rhythm of the verse text works well on the page, though some lines must be read aloud rather carefully to avoid tripping the tongue. Perhaps the intent is to slow the reader's pace. This picture book offers a satisfying double story and illustrations created with considerable finesse.--Phelan, Carolyn Copyright 2010 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Tanaka's (The Magician's Elephant) atmospheric paintings portray a pair of cats who spend their nights in the same way, under the same moon, though they never meet; panel illustrations and spreads show a fluffy white city cat and a sleek country tiger cat leaping, primping, and prowling. As night falls, both prepare to slip off ("One cat watches vans and trucks./ One cat slinks by pigs and ducks") and then to hunt. "Cats' eyes gleam,/ cats blink twice,/ cats get ready,/ cats smell..." (children won't have any trouble supplying the last word: "...mice!"). In two pages of spot illustrations, the cats bound after their quarries, who escape to be pursued another day. Tanaka's moss-green expanses of forest and moonlit rooftops simultaneously draw and haunt. Godwin's (The Doll People) verse is economical and intelligently constructed; wit and action fill her two- and three-word lines. It's an interesting turn on the city mouse and the country mouse; it's clear that both ways of life suit the cats and allow them freedom. The reluctance to give either one primacy carries a quiet message of concord. Ages 2-6. (Aug.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by School Library Journal Review
PreS-Gr 1-Under the light of one moon, two cats are wide awake, one in a city apartment and another in a farmhouse. While the people in their lives are going to sleep, it's clear that the felines have no such intentions. With a "yawn and a stretch," they begin their respective nocturnal journeys. As the urban cat "watches vans and trucks," its rural counterpart "slinks by pigs and ducks." When they "walk the rails," one does so on train tracks while the other tightropes across a rail fence. But whether they roam city streets or country fields, both animals have one passion in common-the pursuit of delectable mice. They "race" and "chase," "creep" and "climb" in a series of small vignettes across a spread in search of their quarry. Only a thunderstorm saves their prey as it forces both felines indoors where they curl up to sleep just as their owners awake to a new day. The brief, rhymed text changes size to match the rhythms of the cats' adventures, and the rich acrylic paintings create an air of nighttime mystery. An ably told and atmospheric romp.-Marianne Saccardi, formerly at Norwalk Community College, CT (c) Copyright 2011. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Horn Book Review
Though its cover sports the eponymous cats arrayed yin-yang fashion to form a moon in a starry sky, the two never actually meet inside the book. They may seem to, on certain background-free pages; most spreads, however, differentiate the white cat's home in town from the striped one's country setting: a farmyard contrasts with a busy street, cobblestones with grass. Still, that moon prompts parallel wakeful behavior: both walk on rails (a fence, a rooftop) and stalk mice. A panoramic scene almost brings them together on a bridge, but it's not to be -- a clap of thunder sends both cats (and mice) scurrying home to snooze at daybreak. This twist on the familiar is enlivened by Godwin's succinct verse ("Cats' eyes gleam, / cats blink twice, / cats get ready, / cats smell... / mice!") and by acrylic art in which Tanaka captures the serene and agile feline grace. The cats' alert focus contrasts nicely with a quiet setting that resembles a classic French town in a rather formal countryside. A pleasing bedtime adventure that could also engage small groups. joanna rudge long (c) Copyright 2011. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
A city cat and a country cat prowl beneath the same dusky moon."One moon. / Two cats / are not asleep. / Cats yawn, / cats stretch, / cats look, / cats LEAP!" City cat watches trucks on the streets below its window. Country cat wends its way past sleepy pigs and ducks. Both groom and explore their separate landscapes until they see a mouse! They chase their mice across their very different territories. Just as each is about to pounce, lightning flashesand it begins to rain. Both kitties return home in the rain, curl up and snooze into morning under the same sun. Godwin's spare, rhymed verse lends itself to the hushed tones of a bedtime read. Tanaka's muted, ochre-cast acrylics are a good match for the text, but, oddly she gives the cats humanlike eyes, which distorts the otherwise realistically depicted kitties. Even during the mouse chase, their eyes remain half-lidded, suggesting near-total exhaustion or, perhaps, an unseen romp in the catnip patch.Overall, though, cat fans will enjoy this sleeping and waking tale that starts and finishes on the end papers.(Picture book. 2-5)]] Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
