My Nine Lives By Clio

The strangest thing happened. The owner of a cat named Clio found a journal under an old couch--a diary that was clearly created by the clever feline herself, now in the joyous throes of her ninth life. The cat's owner knew this unusual historical document must be published! The journal, rough and enticing as a cave painting, begins in Mesopotamia, in 3000 B.C. "Alive! I yawn. I look around. I am in Mespotamia, the 'land between two rivers.' I see fields of wheat and rivers full of fish. I am getting hungry." That night, this valuable cat names the constellations! Life number two begins in China, in 1500 B.C., where Clio serves as the first sundial in the world--except when it's cloudy or when she's off chasing butterflies. She invents the alphabet in Rome in 600 B.C., and twists, flips, and travels through the year 1500, where she lives in Italy with Leonardo Da Vinci, eats cheese, and tests out his flying machine: "The experiment is a flop. But Oh! The views!" Life number nine begins in 1995, in Wisconsin, where nine kittens are born into their first, hugely historic lives. Is any of this conjecture, however delightful, based in fact? An appended section in the back tackles the validity of Clio's journals and unearths some astonishing facts and fictions. For example, "It has been pointed out that if the alphabet wasn't invented until life number three, then how were lives number one and number two written?" Harumph. Marjorie Priceman--illustrator of Lloyd Moss's Caldecott Honor Book Zin! Zin! Zin! A Violin!--tickles our fancy again with her offbeat sense of humor and ever-artful style. A fun, tongue-in-cheek tribute to cats and their unquenchable sense of self-importance. (Ages 6 and older) --Karin Snelson