Catundra

Serendipity

by Stephen Cosgrove, Robin James (Illustrations)

A fat cat loses weight with the help of a friendly mole.

Genres: Childrens, Picture Books, Fiction, Cats, Animals, Fantasy, Classics

32 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1978

Reviews

[Kristen · Rating 1 out of 5]

8/6/20
Knocking it down to one star because I'm still livid almost a year later

10/19/19
I have a lot of beef with this book (and not just because it came into my house and kicked me in the face). A book about the merits of healthy eating and exercise is not a bad thing, and a depression-eating shame-cycle is absolutely a thing that people have to deal with, but this book just handles it all so POORLY.

The long and short of it is that the takeaway seems to be "Being FAT gets you bullied. Don't be fat." Like as soon as the titular character loses weight (which, it's implied, makes her less unattractive), the bullies don't say a damn thing because she had "slimmed down to the prettiest cat they'd ever seen." This is verbatim from the book. This is the thing that is deemed most important ("most importantly"). Not her improved mental and physical health. What the FUCK, y'all.

Maybe...the bullying shouldn't have happened in the first place?? Maybe that should have been part of the takeaway??? The bullies learn nothing, and very likely remain shallow and mean and WILL jump at the chance to verbally abuse that poor kitty as soon as she gains a couple pounds again.

Also, CATS ARE CARNIVOROUS AND CAN'T LIVE OFF OF VEGETABLES what the FUCK. Also, also, if that's milk she's drinking, she will probably throw it up because most adult cats do not handle milk well. Or PIE for that matter. Ffs.

Also also also: maybe healthy coping mechanisms and the importance of a support system should have come up?????? Or how trying to be healthier is good, but you are worthy of respect and love no matter what you look like??????? Exercise is good for your mental health (genrally), but like...you can't just throw the mental health issue in there like a prop and not address it beyond "she' SAD because she's FAT."

Also also also also: she is very likely an apex predator in this forest and should have eaten those fucking rabbits and squirrels for having the audacity to bully her in the first place, don't @ me.

Anyway, this book managed to retroactively hurt child me's feelings, hOLY SHIT. This binch is getting WEEDED. Can you imagine what this could do to a child with low self-esteem??

Tl;dr: a book that I GUESS was supposed to be about living a healthy lifestyle gets derailed by fat shaming.

[Auggie · Rating 2 out of 5]

Beware: Overanalyzation of a children's book ahead.

I grew up on these books, they were some of the first that I ever read by myself. Now that we're looking to expand our little family, I thought it was about time to re-read these precious books, in preparation for bed-time stories.

The first three, at least, were not as adorable as I remember. Catundra in particular was actually a little startling.

Basically you have a very fat cat (proper term here is obese) who learns to love herself only after losing weight and becoming slim, fit, and beautiful.

Now, I'm not against the exercise moral. If one's weight is affecting their health then of course diet and exercise will help you find it again, and I'm sure it was very nice for Catundra to be able to walk again without nearly passing out, but I'm unsure how I feel about reading a story to my children where the ONLY solution for Catundra to be happy and for the other woodland animals to like her was to become pretty. "The other animals will stop laughing at you if you slim down." comes the sage advice from the little mole.

Basically what we're saying here is: "It's your fault you're fat, so it's your fault you're getting bullied. Stop being fat and you won't be bullied anymore."

I get the being healthy moral, but I think it was lost a little in the thinly veiled social disgust for heavy people. If the forest animal's parents had taught them to mind their manners and not bully others, they wouldn't have laughed at Catundra when she was just a "little" heavy, thus Catundra wouldn't have become so isolated and depressed that she ate to hide her feelings and became "a lot" heavy.

Really, the moral of this story should be "Don't be an asshole to other people."

I originally thought that I'd leave this one out of the bed-time story collection for my kids, but then I wrote this review and now I think it's a great way to introduce the concept of "how not to behave towards others."

[Carrie · Rating 2 out of 5]

In general I love Serendipity Books, but I'm used to thinking of them as cute fluff with simple messages - I wasn't expecting one on obesity. :/

The book shows how Catundra became fat through emotional eating and how bullying makes that even worse. It also shows that she can take control of her life by small changes and determination, and how she can find other ways to be happy. If that was the full message, I'd give this book six stars for taking on something very important and doing it well.

But the mole who helps Catundra tells her that losing weight will make her beautiful, and that once she is beautiful and not fat, there will be nothing to bully her about. After she loses weight "the other creatures in the forest didn't call her names because she had slimmed down to the prettiest cat they had ever seen." Right. Because only fat people are/deserve to be bullied.

This is one of the few picture books I've read that I probably would not allow a child to read. Not without discussing the ways in which it is wrong, anyway.

[Meisha (ALittleReader) · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was one of my favorite books as a kid. I use to think that if a cat was chunky and orange, that it must be Catundra from the book! 😅 My mom use to read it all the time to me.
Definitely recommend to any parents looking for a classic cute book to read to your little ones.:)

[Tali · Rating 5 out of 5]

this was my favorite book as a little girl. The basic moral of the story is: if you apply yourself you can do anything. Simple but true, and through the eyes of a fat cat, just funny!

[Gabrielle W. · Rating 4 out of 5]

cute.

[L · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked this book because it was about a kitten that was on an adventure and she was eating too much. I learned that if you eat too much junk food you can get really fat and really sick.

[Annie · Rating 5 out of 5]

A childhood favorite of mine!!!

[Dee · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent book that deals with the subject of body image, self-confidence and health in a way that is suitable for young children.

[Amy · Rating 1 out of 5]

This is the saddest friggin book I've ever read. I want to cry, and hug all the fat cats.

[Baroness · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book has always been one of my favorite’s. The story is meowtastic.

[Auti · Rating 1 out of 5]

i didnt read this book i’m giving it 1 star cuz i know it sucks and the algorithm should reflect that

[Glenn Gargiulo · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is great and I love reading it to my kids. I hope they learn the lesson the book teaches. You create your own destiny. Take control and stop feeling sorry for yourself...

[Elizabeth Turner · Rating 1 out of 5]

Fat shaming for little kids! Get it right here! :)

[Kimberly Souza · Rating 4 out of 5]

Love

[Meaghan Blunck · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book is terrible. Get skinny so others will stop being mean to you. That is a horrifyingly toxic message. I can’t read this to a child.

[Kelly (Maybedog) · Rating 1 out of 5]

Wow do I have a different take on Serendipity books now. This book is horrible. This book may be written for kids, but that's exactly who suffers with this kind of attitude and treatment. This is absolutely targeted for young children who are ridiculed. I was one of those children and by today's standards I was barely overweight. Does that matter? NO.

1. The cat has no friends because she's fat. People are mean to her. That's awful. She should be accepted as she is.
2. She's told that if she loses weight, she'll have friends. Those should be two different things.
3. She's hungry because she's miserable. No, she may be hungry because she has more body to feed. She eats when she's not hungry because she's miserable. And the biggest problem with people doing that is not the quantity of food, but what they eat.
4. She's told to go on a diet so she won't be teased and therefore won't be miserable:

Rather than eating, you should go on a diet and get yourself in shape. If you're fit, then nobody can make fun of you, and if they don't make fun of you, you won't be miserable and if you're not miserable you won't want to eat."

If people make fun of her, they're going to find other ways. I know overweight kids who have a ton of friends because they have good social skills. The weight is just an easy way to make fun of her.
5. She learns to eat better and get exercise in order to lose weight to make friends, not to become healthy.
6. Her food was controlled by someone else. It wasn't put into her own hands to learn how to control herself.
7. Even as she lost weight, critters still made fun of her. Only when she got thin was she accepted.
8. When she was thin, she was then the prettiest cat anyone had ever seen. I'm sorry, but there are some beautiful fat people. Someone who is drop dead gorgeous is still going to be pretty to the masses when she's overweight, just not as pretty.

HOWEVER she is still beautiful and it's terrible that the critters weren't blamed for their cruelty but she was for not being like they were. Never once was she told to ignore them, she was a good person the way she was.

People eat and hide away and not get exercise because they feel bad about themselves. Losing weight might help, but it's not going to cure the problem. The person needs to feel that inside s/he is a good person, that she's acceptable now. Only then will s/he be able to lose weight and keep it off.

PLUS there is a lot of evidence showing that it's extremely difficult for people who are significantly overweight to lose the weight and keep it off. Are they only acceptable when they are thin?

It's not the era when this was written, either, because plenty of media such as "ads" like "Hankering for a hunk of cheese" (much like Schoolhouse Rock) and Free to Be You and Me were sending very different messages. Everyone should try to eat healthy but if they find food to be a comfort for emotional issues, they should be blamed.

[K · Rating 1 out of 5]

This is, possibly, Cosgrove's worst book. As a kid, I liked the illustrations (Catundra was very beautiful, even when "fat") but never really enjoyed the story itself. As an adult, I hate pretty much everything about it.

Catundra lives in a remote house in the woods because isolating herself is the only way to keep the other animals from making fun of her. Which they do because she's fat. And because their taunts make her sad, she eats more, which makes her fatter, which of course starts the cycle over.

This fat cat spends her days sobbing, eating, and sobbing more because she's so miserable. Finally, she meets a mole whom she catches and intends to eat, until he helps her out by getting to the root of her problem - her weight. "If you're not fat, then nobody can make fun of you," he says.

Turns out he's right. Catundra starts exercising regularly and eating better (meaning vegetables?? for a cat??). The mole strictly watches over her diet, but "once he even let her catch a small minnow from the stream just to keep her strength." Which implies that her diet was so intense that she was in danger of passing out from hunger.

If I haven't made it clear yet, this book is awful.

Ultimately, Catundra is successful. She's happier and (theoretically) healthier now, which is good: "the most surprising thing was that she wasn't sad or melancholy anymore."

This could've been at least a reasonably good place to leave it - Catundra making active decisions about her own life and feeling better about herself as a result - but her emotional health isn't the point of this story. No, Cosgrove says, "Most importantly, the other creatures of the forest didn't call her names because she had slimmed down to the prettiest cat they had ever seen."

And in case it hadn't been hammered in enough that all of the teasing and bullying was entirely Catundra's fault for being fat (and therefore ugly), the rhyme at the end makes it even more clear for the audience:

"So, if you're fat and overweight / And feeling oh so blue, / Remember that little rag tag mole / And what he had Catundra do."

Again: what an absolutely terrible book. 1 star for the quality of the art and only because this site won't let me give anything a zero.

[Erin · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book INFURIATES me!! It’s complete garbage. It’s a great way to teach children negative body image, harmful self talk, judgement of others, bullying, and unhealthy eating and exercising behaviors. It’s a diet culture lesson for kids.. which is clearly asinine. My daughter brought it home from the school library when she was FIVE years old! To say I was mad is an understatement. Generally, I’m not in favor of censorship, but this book needs to disappear.

It features:
- Fat shaming by bullies AND friends alike.
- Self shaming.
- Diminishment of the seriousness of mental health struggles.
- The message that conformity will fix bullying problems.
- Very disordered eating/exercising habits and platitudes.
- Actual statements that losing weight makes you happy.

Real quote from the book:
“Most importantly, the other creatures of the forest didn’t call her names because she had slimmed down to the prettiest cat they had ever seen.”

Garbage.

[Emily Nuttall · Rating 1 out of 5]

Started off wonderfully...but quickly went downhill.

Moral of the story? People will only like you if you are skinny and beautiful.

When Catundra was small she was a little overweight and got bullied, so she moves away and secluded herself in the forest. The forest animals all still make fun of her so she continues emotionally eating, getting larger and larger until one day she tries to eat a mole. The mole convinces her that he'd help her lose weight so the other animals won't make fun of her. She loses weight, they become friends and the other animals stop making fun of her.

So remember kids, you are only loveable if you are skinny and beautiful.


10/10 would not read to my children.

Also to add my own personal experience to this...even if I wasn't a fat kid I would have still been bullied.

[Claire Vogel · Rating 1 out of 5]

I literally threw this book away after I read it to my son before nap. It's the first time either of us have read it, but it was just in our inherited pile of books and had a cat on the front so seemed good. The story is about a fat cat who lived in a dilapidated building in the forest, and she was so fat all the forest creatures made fun of her. This made her feel bad, so she emotionally ate. After running out of all other food she found a mole to eat. The mole convinced her instead to go on a diet and get really fit. So instead of the mole she ate vegetables and got skinny and the other animals stopped making fun of her. The end.

What the actual f***.

[Lyl Lyl · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book teaches a very powerful lesson, understandable for young ages. I just read it to my 6 year old nephew and 4 year old niece last night, and they both liked it, while also, noting what foods she was eating that were not good/good, and thinking she looked pretty by the end, when at first their only word for her was 'fat'. They comprehended the concept, that she kept indulging in that which gave those who teased her more fuel to do so because she felt miserable about the teasing. Good book.

[Ben · Rating 1 out of 5]

This central message of this book is that fat people should seek the approval of bullies to find happiness by starving themselves and exercising obsessively, and that happiness is won by being so beautiful and slim "no one can make fun of you."

It also manages to conflate eating with self-loathing (once she was thin, she wasn't miserable, and so she didn't eat).

So this book manages to promote victim blaming, fat shaming, and anorexia all at once.

It's rare that I outright destroy a book, but we got 2 pages in before we stopped reading it to our kids. One less copy in the world.

[Jeremy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love this book! This was one of the first books I bought from the book fair in elementary school. The main theme is self-empowerment and taking charge of your own happiness and life circumstances. I also really love the artwork and glossy pages in the 1978 edition that I have. This book really doesn't deserve all the hate it's gotten in the comments section, especially from those who admitted they never read the book.

[J · Rating 3 out of 5]

Cute story about the effects of bullying and emotional eating so I would recommend it for maybe an older audience rather a younger audience of Serendipity readers. The writing was sweet, short and simple to understand just like the lessons.

And everyone that likes cats will fall in love with Catundra whether she is obese or thin.

[Ash · Rating 4 out of 5]

"In a perfect part of the forest, in a land of fur, purrs, and meows, stood an old dilapidated cabin that no one had lived in for a long, long time."
I love my child self. I must have literally read this book and thought it was the greatest thing ever as a youngling because it's about a big fat fluffy cat who loses weight and makes friends with a little mole. #heartofachild

[Amanda Myhre · Rating 1 out of 5]

this book is so mean it sucks.

[Ashley · Rating 5 out of 5]

Check out my blog, Books from Bleh to Basically Amazing for my thoughts and memories of the Serendipity series!

[Cassandra · Rating 4 out of 5]

hahahaha....

[Linda Irvine]

I loved these at 5 or 6, and love them even more at 38.