4 out of 4 stars
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The Diary of a Snoopy Cat by R.F. Kristi is a detective story for children. This is the 5th book in the Inca book series and it is centered on a family of three cats, one hamster and two humanoids (as they are referred to in the book). The book starts by describing the personality of each character in this family. There is Inca – a Siberian kitty, Cara – a Siamese kitty, Fromage – a Tabby-Cat, Chalotte – a Roborovski dwarf hamster, Mom (also called Missy) and Aunt Florence.
Inca and her family had just moved to London from Paris. They made friends with Monk, a blue Russian cat, and Terrance, a golden retriever, and helped solve the case of a stolen diamond necklace. Terrance and Monk live with a world famous detective, Solo. Terrance was popular in the animal kingdom for having helped Solo solve many detective cases. One Sunday night, Monk comes over with grave news. The cats and dog meet at Solo’s huge and fancy house to discuss the situation. It so happens that Terrance and Solo have to go on a dangerous journey to the Himalayas to find out if the information they got of a wounded foreigner being taken care of by the locals there might be the lead they need to help find a missing friend. While they were gone, another case surface back home. The group has been approached by Boss, a fearsome, unfriendly dog, to help solve the mystery of a missing will. With Terrance, the doggie-detective out of town, Inca takes the lead in the group. As Christmas draws near, tension heightens. Will Terrance and Solo come back home safely and before Christmas and will Inca be able to find the missing will without Terrance.
I enjoyed reading this book mostly because the cats and dogs think of the people in their family as being owned by them. I found it quite amusing in fact. One particular part of the story that had me smiling from ear to ear was once when Missy, their mom was writing out the daily sales of the cheese shop that is their family business. Inca sat nearby and watched her work, thinking to keep an eye on how ‘our’ business was going.
The illustrations make this book even more enjoyable. They depict their respective passages quite well and make the book even more enjoyable. Children between the ages 7 to 9 will enjoy reading this book because of its child-friendly writing style and its central theme of friendship. Each chapter of the book is a new entry into Inca’s diary. This in itself might encourage a few children to start a journal or diary of their own and hopefully, improve their writing over time.
The only thing I did not like about the book is that it has lots of characters – 23 characters to be exact. It was quite confusing as I kept mixing up Solo and Polo, and so many other characters. I will confess that it was on my second read of the book I realized that Solo and Hobbs were humans (funny, right?).
The editing of the book was well done as I did not come across any errors. Despite my initial confusion, I rate this book 4 out of 4 stars as I enjoyed reading about Inca’s adventure even on my first read. I recommend this book to children of ages 7 to 9, as I have earlier noted, because I believe the reading level to be just challenging enough for them. Children who love animals will also find this book interesting. The morals to be gained in the book are friendship, acceptance, helping those in need and team work.
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Diary of a Snoopy Cat
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