The Mouse Butcher

The humans have mysteriously disappeared from the town and the cats they have left behind have donned the personalities of their previous masters, creating a town community of their own. Cleverly Dick King-Smith has created caricatures in the crafty butcher's cat, the knowledgeable 'Giglamps' from the doctor's surgery and the pedigree Persian colonel's family from the estate on the hill. I could not help feeling that there was something seedy and distasteful about this story, apt perhaps in the dying town. I also found the escapades of Tom Plug the butcher's cat and his fellow felines decidedly gruesome. Dick King-Smith knows his children, however, and testers found it exciting from beginning to end. The gruesome elements were hugely admired and there were even comments that the cover was not gruesome enough. Not for the squeamish but sure to be popular across the middle school range.