Book Review: The Christmas Cats Chase Christmas Rats

Author: Constance Corcoran Wilson
Title: The Christmas Cats Chase Christmas Rats (Christmas Cats #1)
Genre: Child's book, fantasy
Pages: 32 pages
First Published: October 22nd, 2013
Where I Got It: Given to me for honest and unbiased opinion by the author/publisher

"The Christmas Cats Chase Christmas Rats is a Seuss-ical tale for young children which builds upon the moral of the first Christmas Cats book to once again teach children a valuable life lesson. 

In this second Christmas Cats adventure the lesson to be learned is: In life, always keep an open mind. Don't accept stereotypes as true or let the unfounded opinions of others prevent you from finding out the truth for yourself. We all need to act without prejudice and learn to accept each other as individuals.

The Christmas Cats learn that rats, too, should be judged as individuals. Another message: all of us should try to help others.

Written for the author's four-year-old granddaughters, Ava and Elise Wilson, with the assistance of talented professional illustrator Gary McCloskey, The Christmas Cats continue to have adventures while attired in their familiar silly hats from Book One (The Christmas Cats in Silly Hats).

Learning to accept others in a non-judgmental, open-minded fashion is a lesson we all must learn. If children can internalize this behavior while young, learning to help others and to do good works, the world will be a better place"

Like earlier stated I read this for the publisher/author for my honest and unbiased opinion.

I couldn't help myself when I seen this book. Just the cover and title had me drawn in like a bee for honey. Yes, it's a kid book and I don't have any rugrats of my own yet, but I do like to check out an occasional kid book. There are little kids running amuck in my life and I love them. I like exploring the books and seeing what would and wouldn't make a good book for them. After reading this, I would say this would be for 4+, so it's a little old for my "nephews". But it would be perfect for my cousin's kids.

This was super, duper cute. It was very short, but you can only keep a kid's attention for so long. I loved the rhyming and Dr. Seuss feel to it. However, there were no made up words (darn), but it was more realistic. Which is good, I suppose. The pictures were very adorable too. Ah, I miss picture books. *sighs*

Such a good way to get to children the good ol' moral lesson of loving those who are different then you. The author used cats and rats (which not only rhyme), but are sworn enemies! The cats aid the rats and it was cute. I especially loved the hats that the cats had to wear (again, rhyming at its best). 

One thing did lift my brow a wee bit. The glorifying testing on rats. Some would argue that testing on rats is a good thing, because it has helped us with many cures and etc...but the story makes it seem that rats chose this life of saving us. Meh. Luckily it wasn't the main thing of the book, because I would have had major issues on this. Poor, nasty, rats...

ANYWAYS....this was a cute read and I would recommend that children 4+ be read this book. The story was cute (besides for the mentioning of the "goodness" that rats do while being tested) and the pictures were adorable. Out of five stars I shall stamp this with 3...it's more like 3.3-3.4, but I don't give decimals, so I rounded. 

Favorite Character(s): The kitties. :)

Not-so Favorite Character(s): The Lab testers