Review by Ali B -- Diary of a Snoopy Cat by R.F. Kristi

This forum is for volunteer reviews by members of our review team. These reviews are done voluntarily by the reviewers and are published in this forum, separate from the official professional reviews. These reviews are kept separate primarily because the same book may be reviewed by many different reviewers.
Forum rules
Authors and publishers are not able to post replies in the review topics.
Post Reply
User avatar
Ali B
Posts: 25
Joined: 27 Nov 2017, 15:28
Currently Reading: The tree of yoga
Bookshelf Size: 58
Reviewer Page: onlinebookclub.org/reviews/by-ali-b.html
Latest Review: "McDowell" by William H. Coles
Reading Device: B00MHI0QGQ

Review by Ali B -- Diary of a Snoopy Cat by R.F. Kristi

Post by Ali B »

[Following is a volunteer review of "Diary of a Snoopy Cat" by R.F. Kristi.]
Book Cover
2 out of 4 stars
Share This Review


Diary Of A Snoopy Cat by R.F. Kristi, illustrated by Jorje Valle

The Diary of a Snoopy Cat is a children's book I believe is aimed at those aged between around 6 to 9 years. The story has been written as a count down to Christmas and is told by Inca the cat. Inca’s Mum is a person, called Missy, as is her Aunt Florence, however, the rest of her family are a collection of cats and a hamster. Inca begins by introducing the members of her family; describing a little of their personalities and how they relate to one another. They are all different breeds and have come together to live with their Mum and a hamster! Inca explains how they own a cheese shop in Kensington, London, and how much they enjoy cheese, especially her brother who is called Fromage. Inca is very keen to write a book in the form of a diary. She would also like to be a brilliant cat detective but she wishes to do this by herself and not have any involvement from either her brother or her sister.

The story starts as Inca is having a nap and spots something out of the window. It turns out to be the cat from next door who invites Inca and the other animals to his house that evening as he has some news to share. Once Missy is asleep they all head over and discover that the owner of one of their dog pals, called Polo, has gone missing while trekking in the Himalayas. Fortunately one of the friends knows someone who works for a charity in Nepal, and they think that Polo’s owner is being looked after in a hospital there. Between them, they decide, that three of them should travel to Kathmandu, the Capital of Nepal, and bring home the lost owner. After studying a map and discussing some mountain geography they all head off for their holiday vaccinations before boarding their direct flight to Kathmandu.

In the meantime, and while it is being decided that Aunt Florence will travel from Provence, France, in order to spend Christmas with Inca and her family, another neighbour, called Boss, turns up at Inca’s house. Boss is a burly dog that they are all a little afraid of, however, he is in a bit of a fix and is asking them for some help. Boss’ owner, Mr. Finchley, has recently died and left his house to his nephew, Ned, in his Will. However, Mr. Finchley has another nephew who has stolen the Will and is claiming ownership of the house for himself. Inca and her team are called upon to be the great detective’s they hope to be and discover the hiding place of the hidden Will, in order that Ned can re-claim his home.

Inca is keen to work alone and be the star of the detective agency they have created in her name and she successfully retrieves the hidden item and shows it to Missy. Missy is then able to involve the relevant authorities and peace is restored to the neighbourhood.

Once they have achieved this, Polo and the gang return from Nepal with his owner, having identified him at the hospital and brought him home.

Eventually, and after some other random shenanigans, Christmas arrives, along with Aunt Florence, and some of them eat blue cheese cake made by Fromage the cat.

There was an awful lot of content in this story, almost enough for two shorter books, possibly three. I felt that each of the intertwining storylines were reasonable concepts in their own right but they just did not flow well when merged in this way. Whilst I have attempted to summarise the main storyline with as much detail as possible, there are many other story threads that I have not included in my synopsis. The whole book is overly complicated when one considers the target audience and also when one considers the parent’s who will be reading the story to their children! There are nuggets of detail that are not followed up as the story progresses and so are simply superfluous. There is also some use of terminology that I would argue is not appropriate for small children: At one point, Inca wonders whether the creature staring through the window trying to catch her attention is, among other things, a demon. I, personally, would rather avoid having to explain the idea of what a demon is to my small children. The detective gang also decide to nickname the unpleasant nephew, a Stinky Porkster. This is because he is large, round and smells unpleasant. Again, I would struggle to advocate ‘name calling’ to small children. In addition to this, I would like to have seen more encouragement of teamwork, rather than Inca doing, and achieving, everything alone and being the best all the time. Children's stories are such useful opportunities to teach important life lessons and I think some of those opportunities were missed in this book.

I also dislike reading books that are set in the U.K but have been Americanised, I assume during the editing process.

The author used the charity, Doctors Without Borders, as part of the story and I thought this was an interesting and thoughtful part of the book. This section also focussed on some of the unusual mountainous geographies in Nepal and the Himalayas and both of these subjects provide the opportunity to initiate great conversations with children.

As I’ve previously written, I think there are a number of good concepts within this book and if they were to be dismantled and reassembled in their own right, would make for stories I would like to read to my children. As it is though, it is too complex and disjointed to be a book I would recommend to my friends and their children, therefore, I rate this book 2 out of 4 stars.

******
Diary of a Snoopy Cat
View: on Bookshelves | on Amazon

Like Ali B's review? Post a comment saying so!
Latest Review: "McDowell" by William H. Coles
kdstrack
Previous Member of the Month
Posts: 6473
Joined: 10 May 2017, 19:49
Currently Reading: The Savior
Bookshelf Size: 530
Reviewer Page: onlinebookclub.org/reviews/by-kdstrack.html
Latest Review: How To Be Successful by M. Curtis McCoy

Post by kdstrack »

Thanks for your thoughtful comments on this book. Your comment about name calling is interesting. I also liked that teamwork and family were highlighted in the book. Great job.
Post Reply

Return to “Volunteer Reviews”