by Moe Zilla

Created on: February 26, 2010

Tomek Bogacki had already written three other books about "a curious little mouse and a curious little cat." He'd introduced the two unlikely friends in the book "Cat and Mouse," then showed them exploring the weather in "Cat and Mouse in the Rain."  Night-time can be scary, but the two animals confront it together in - what else? - "Cat and Mouse in the Night." But the fourth book has Bogacki's charming characters finally recognizing the arrival of winter.

The characters sneak out early to play in the green meadow, "But on this day the world around them looked very different. It was all white."

"Where is the green meadow?" asks the little mouse.

"It's gone," says the little cat…

They climb to the top of the hill to search for it. They're joined by the other little mice and little cats. And in a funny twist, Cat and Mouse have fallen into the snow, and rise up covered with white, powdery snow. "Eek!" all the little mice squeak, as the little cats decide that two must be monsters.

It's a nice way to re-visit the formula of the earlier books in the series. But the book also teaches its audience a gentle and valuable lesson. Yes, the world looks different when it's covered with snow, but soon the creatures begin to understand. "[T]hey knew that the green meadow hadn't gone away. It was now the snowy meadow!"

Soon the fleeing cats and mice are covered with snow themselves, and they realize that snow is harmless - and can even be fun. They burst out laughing when they realize they all look like white monsters now -and then they try sliding down the hill. They roll giant snowballs for throwing, and "they played and played until their coats were wet and their paws were cold." And that night they talk excitedly about all the fun they had in the snowy meadow.

The story is simple and funny, but Tomek Bogacki is also a very good artist. The book's jacket identifies him as a painter and a sculptor as well as an illustrator, and he knows how to use all the right artistic elements to create the book's atmosphere. He uses a cold, wintry color scheme, with a grey-blue sky that almost made me feel the chill. But there's lots of white, and it makes the snow look soft and splotchy.

And also a lot of fun…

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