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Wardlaw, Lee. 
WON TON : A CAT TALE TOLD IN HAIKU
New York : Holt, 2011
IL K-3, RL 3.0
ISBN 0805089950

(2 booktalks)
Click on the book to read Amazon reviews
Booktalk #1

Have you ever adopted a pet from a shelter and wondered what that pet might be thinking?  Was he scared?  Would she like you?  The story of Won Ton the shelter cat is told from the cat’s point of view.  As we see the sleek black cat in the shelter getting chosen by a young boy and riding to his new home in a car, we hear the cat’s thoughts in expressive haiku poems.  How will things work out for this spunky cat?  Will his new family give him a proper name?  Will he like his new home?  Read Won Ton to find out.  (Pennsylvania Young Reader’s Choice Awards Program Booktalks 2012-2013)

Booktalk #2

Won-Ton, or so a boy calls him, is a shelter cat at the beginning of this story told entirely in haiku.  As cats will sometimes do, he feigns indifference during visiting time at the shelter, but of course, he secretly wants someone to take him home… someone who will scratch his chin just right.  Finally, the right boy arrives, and the cat thinks:

             “No rush. I’ve got plans,

gnaw this paw, nip that flea, and

wish, please boy, pick me.”

 When the boy chooses him, the cat does not like the car ride but survives and arrives safely at his new home.  He hides for a while, silently checking the place out.  The boy meanwhile tries to decide on a name for his new pet and finally settles on Won-Ton. Won-Ton eventually makes himself comfortable doing what cats do, jumping and running, knocking over lamps and such, and occasionally depositing unpleasant messes in undesired places like shoes.

The illustrations are perfect for the text, descriptive and bold, enhancing the story. Read Lee Wardlaw’s Won-Ton: A Cat Tale Told in Haiku to discover how a boy and a stubborn cat learn to love each other. 
(Booktalk by the Sequoya Youth Book Award committee, 2014)



SUBJECTS:     Cat adoption -- Fiction.
                        Cats -- Fiction.
                        Haiku.
                        Picture books for children.

 
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