PW’s Children’s Bookshelf picked this book for its cover of the week.
David Saylor, v-p and creative director at Scholastic, had this to say about it:
This was one of those rare cases that a cover comes in that’s just perfectit is so cute that you fall in love with the characters immediately.
Sigh. I begin to think that I’m not a good judge of children’s books. Maybe I’m too old, too straight, too idealistic, too blind, too something. I simply don’t like this cover. I think the cat is ugly and the color is depressing.
The book has no words. It is picture book for young kids about a cat who comes to the city but misses the country. He plants a garden in the city and the story is supposed to be a wonderful tale of friendship. It may be a cute book, but the cover leaves me cold and I can’t imagine that the inside will be much better. After all, according to David Saylor the cover is perfection so how would you improve upon it?
Yikes! What’s the matter with kids these days, Ethel?
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I guess I don’t get the cover either. It’s okay–kind of cute in an ugly sort of way, but it doesn’t make me want to open the book to see what’s going on inside.
I guess it is an “eye-of-the-beholder” thing. I’ve been told my books’ covers are everything from cheesy to beautiful works of art, so eye appeal is obviously subjective. I just want a cover that catches my eye and makes me want to check it out. This chicken and cat don’t grab me at all.
Cute in an ugly sort of way? It’s two scrawny-limbed, bug-eyed animals walking down a gray sidewalk surrounded by gray.
I’m sorry I criticized it, though, because I open my blog today to see I put an apostrophe in its when it didn’t belong and later I used the pronoun it to refer to the act of planting a garden when I meant to use it to refer to the story. Ugh. This is what happens when I pick on someone else–God lets me see my own frailties. I’d rather be blissfully ignorant of my many typos, spelling errors, and grammatical lapses.
Oh well, I still find that cover distasteful.
Now your covers, I love. I think they are all excellent. The color, the dragons, the kids–all very well done. I can’t imagine a kid passing those books up. Well, I guess if the kid hated dragons or fantasy or something . . .
OK, you’re right. There is an “eye of the beholder” aspect. The eye of this beholder says, “Uninteresting!”
Babies–and this book is written for babies–love bright colors, I was always told. So what is with the drab look of this book? What is up with the Rugrats and the Ed, Edd, and Eddy business? Who decided that ugly, misshapen, and drab was cute?
Whoever sold teletubbies, I think.
But I saw totally different things, like the title says Chicken and Cat and the picture is a cat and chicken. That doesn’t seem like good teaching to me. And yes, books for babies ALL teach, whether the creators want them to or not. These little people are being informed of the world and how we inform them is as important as anything.
I also thought from the look on that cat’s face that he was probably trying to decide just when he could pounce. I mean, that IS what cats do with birds. But from your description, Sally, it sounds like this book is PC and trying to teach tolerance. What’s new!
So I hate the cover, though I am neutral about the aethsetics. Oh, I certainly find nothing “loveable” about the characters.
Dragons in Our Midst covers, cheesy? HUH??? Maybe I don’t understand the meaning of that word after all. If a realistic depiction of a scene rendered in eye-catching color is cheesy, …
Becky
Becky, good point about the order of the words. I didn’t notice.
I think when people say “cheesy” (I’ve heard it twice about the first cover), they don’t know what the word really means. I think they mean unsophisticated or perhaps schmaltzy, even too innocent.
OK Miller, first you spoke ill of the Hobbit and now you’re gunning for the teletubbies. You’re living on borrowed time, woman!!
heh heh. I’m joking. The teletubbies were awful. But I must admit I bought one–a two-foot tall one–for my son one year for Christmas. It was lime green–can’t remember its name, Dipsy or something.
PS What is next, I wonder? I won’t be surprised to open up my little blog tomorrow and find you badmouthing Spongebob Squarepants.
Hahah–neither would I. That’s an easy one to badmouth without knowing anything about it. A sponge? A SPONGE??? What are we coming to that we have no more imagination than to make heros from sponges? And what happened to square being, well, square?
(I got a funny e-mail forward from my uncle about words that have passed out of our vocabulary–I deleted it so as not to be tempted to forward it myselff, and now I want it to quote from. It had things like steering wheel knob and fender skirt, I think, and running board. Others I won’t repeat in public, but along the lines of unmentionables. Well, I guess that one was on the list, too.)
So, did I cross the badmouthing line? heh heh heh
Bryan, “unsophisticated” or “schmaltzy” or “too innocent,” eh. Well, worse things have been said than “too innocent.” Nope, I see nothing but eye-catching, realistic scenes from action/fantasies.
Becky
Now Spongebob is actually very cool. I’m not sure why. It must be that “eye of the beholder” deal again. He’s really square and has the thin limbs and the bug eyes . . . hey, he looks suspiciously like cat and chicken of Chicken and Cat fame. heh heh. And yet, that little square guy is so cute. It must be his voice. ha ha (he has this terrible nasally, whiny voice.)
What happened to Mr. Toad and Brer Rabbit or the Little Engine that Could? Now those were interesting characters to fall in love with.
Even Mighty Mouse.
Or Donald Duck and especially Uncle Scrooge.
These poor kids today …
Beck