LITTLE PUSSYCAT, A LITTLE GOLDEN BOOK

by Margaret Wise Brown

Pussy Willow is a little cat who names himself after the pussywillows.

The book was originally published as Pussy Willow.

Genres: Picture Books, Childrens, Young Adult, Animals

32 pages, Hardcover

First published June 15, 1979

About the author

Margaret Wise Brown wrote hundreds of books and stories during her life, but she is best known for Goodnight Moon and The Runaway Bunny. Even though she died nearly 70 years ago, her books still sell very well.

Margaret loved animals. Most of her books have animals as characters in the story. She liked to write books that had a rhythm to them. Sometimes she would put a hard word into the story or poem. She thought this made children think harder when they are reading.

She wrote all the time. There are many scraps of paper where she quickly wrote down a story idea or a poem. She said she dreamed stories and then had to write them down in the morning before she forgot them.

She tried to write the way children wanted to hear a story, which often isn't the same way an adult would tell a story. She also taught illustrators to draw the way a child saw things. One time she gave two puppies to someone who was going to draw a book with that kind of dog. The illustrator painted many pictures one day and then fell asleep. When he woke up, the papers he painted on were bare. The puppies had licked all the paint off the paper.

Margaret died after surgery for a bursting appendix while in France. She had many friends who still miss her. They say she was a creative genius who made a room come to life with her excitement. Margaret saw herself as something else - a writer of songs and nonsense.

Reviews

[Christy Roberts · Rating 5 out of 5]

I had this as a kid but I don't remember it being read to me back then. It's about a little cat who names itself Pussy Willow after the flowers.

The season's come and go and the little cat is trying to find the flowers that look like him again because he didn't understand where they went. The drawings and pictures are awesome. I love the interaction with the animals the squirrel was probably my favorite oh and the birds with the cat sleeping in the nest that was adorable.

[Little Seesaw · Rating 1 out of 5]

I was reading this with hazel and she said, "Let's give this book a one." A few minutes later she said do we have to keep reading it? It's boring. I went ahead and finished it. She was right. Although, we both agreed that we really liked the art work.

[Wayne Walker · Rating 5 out of 5]

In this last of three older Little Golden Books that I purchased at a used bookstore a couple of years ago, Pussy Willow is a little pussycat who was born one spring in a forest under the pussywillows. He is not much bigger than a pussywillow, and is just as soft and gray as those little flowers clinging to the branches all about him, so he is called Pussy Willow. He meets a bug, a peeper, and a deer mouse. As time passes by, Pussy Willow looks up and notices that the pussywillows are gone, replaced by little green leaves, so he goes to look for them. As summer comes, he asks a butterfly, some friendly birds, a bee, a mole, a rabbit, a skunk, and even a hermit crab down by the sea. After fall arrives, he asks a squirrel. In winter, he falls asleep in the shadow of a groundhog. Will he ever find his pussywillows? And if so, when and where?
Margaret Wise Brown (1910-1952) was a prolific American writer of children's books, including the picture books Goodnight Moon, perhaps her best known work, which I have read and reviewed, and The Runaway Bunny, which I have not, both illustrated by Clement Hurd. Early in the 1950s she wrote several books for the Little Golden Books series, including The Color Kittens, Mister Dog, and Scuppers The Sailor Dog. Another one of that series is The Whispering Rabbit, which I have also read and reviewed. By the time of her unexpected death at age 42 from an embolism two weeks after emergency surgery for an ovarian cyst, Brown had authored well over one hundred books. Little Pussycat would be a good fictional story for young children to accompany a study about cats, forest animals, and/or the changing of the seasons.

[Joy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pussy Willow is a little gray cat who names himself after the surrounding pussywillows in spring. As the seasons change, he searches for the pussywillows (who have disappeared with the seasons).

This book reminds me a lot of the The Golden Bunny.