The Great Catnapping

Author: Emily Ecton
Illustrator: David Mottram

© Date: 2024
Publisher: Atheneum Books for Young Readers
Pages: 235
Chapters: Yes
Illustrations: Yes, but most page layouts do not have illustrations
Publisher Recommended Age: 8-12
Bonus Activities at End of Book: No

Summary from Book: Cat wrangler to the stars!

That’s Madison’s new job. The white cat, who is famous as a spokes-cat for Beautiful Buffet Cat Food, is making a TV appearance at a supermarket opening. And the supermarket wants Walt too. Everyone is excited that Walt will be a celebrity-everyone except Walt.

Two cats loose in a supermarket? What could go wrong? It turns out everything can. Chaos erupts at the grand opening, and suddenly the white cat and Walt are nowhere to be seen. They’ve been catnapped! The police are on the case, but they’re no closer to finding the missing felines. Desperate to get their friends home safe and sound, Butterbean and the gang decide to take matters into their own paws…

Page Pig Thoughts: Yet another funny crime story with The Great Pet Heist animals. Humor definitely takes the tension out of the heavier subject matter of kidnappers, ransom, and missing friends/family. I appreciate that the animals are all kind to each other and develop a large network of Walt/white cat information seekers. The illustration style changed, so we were a little disappointed in the appearance of the characters. This one definitely gets Page Pup thumbs up and we hope for another one.

Family Unit: Humans and pets that make a family. Mrs. Food (elderly woman), Madison (school age girl), Butterbean (Long haired Dachshund), Walt (Oriental short hair cat), Oscar (mynah bird), Marco and Polo (rats).

Madison (school age girl) is currently living with Mrs. Food while her aunt is deployed.

Wallace the rat was a pet rat, then he lived in the vents, but now he has attempted to move into a new apartment. He enjoys visiting at Mrs. Food’s apartment.

Chad the octopus lives in an apartment in the building, but comes to Mrs. Food’s to eat food.

The white cat lives in an apartment in the building, but comes to Mrs. Food’s to hang out/pester the pets.

Conflict/Social Issues:

Walt and the white cat are kidnapped and trying to figure out how to get home.
Oscar, Butterbean, Marco, Polo, Wallace, and Chad are working together to try to find Walt.
When even just Walt is missing from Mrs. Food’s apartment, the other animals all feel a bit lost. When Butterbean and Polo are gone, the others struggle a bit.

Positive Items:

The pets work well together, accept each other for who they are, and make plans that take advantage of each other’s strong skills. They are also aware of their shortcomings (e.g. Butterbean needs to go out for reconnaissance, but knows that she should not be left by herself, so Polo goes along).
Walt and the white cat work together to make an escape plan.
Other animals in the Strathmore building and dog park are willing to help look for information on the cat’s whereabouts.
Kindness matters. The simple act of taking the time to make sure all of the Strathmore building animals are included in information gathering pays off when the unlikely animal resident has the most useful information. Even Outside Biscuit seemed unlikely to be helpful, but he was super helpful in the end.

Items of Interest:

The white cat is having a publicity appearance at a local supermarket opening. Madison is super excited that she can watch over the white cat and bring along Walt, who will be the Before Cat.
Butterbean cuts her tail on Walt’s kennel. It bleeds a lot and blood goes everywhere when she wags her tail.
The lobster tank is shattered and lots of lobsters start crawling around the supermarket, which is the distraction for the white cat to be kidnapped.
Madison is super upset that she left the cats to help with the lobsters (she was told to do so) and that Walt is missing. Madison watches the recording of the event over and over. Eventually she actually picks up on hints of who the culprits are, but there isn’t enough evidence for the police to do much with her tips.
Walt is able to get over her pride of the kidnappers not even knowing that she was in the kennel when the white cat was grabbed. That means that Walt can sneak around the kidnapper’s home and work on an escape plan with the white cat.
The white cat is very angry to discover that her agent, Mr. Hal, is one of the kidnappers.
The kidnappers call the owner of the white cat to ask for a ransom, which was the whole reason that the white cat was kidnapped.
Mrs. Food’s pets were planning to use some of their Pet Heist treasure to pay the ransom for Walt. Except Walt was not involved in the original ransom call. The pets are left trying to figure out what really happened to Walt.
Chad is super mad to be sent to ask Leia the goldfish about Walt. Some of the pipes are disgusting, but more importantly, he doesn’t see how she would be helpful. The other animals wouldn’t want their feelings hurt knowing that everyone else was asked but them, so they want to be nice to Leia. In the end, Leia is the one with the piece of information that ties kidnapping evidence together.
Walt and the white cat meet a new dog, Outside Biscuit, that turns out to be more helpful than they expected.
Outside Biscuit finds Butterbean at the dog park and tells her that he knows where Walt is. Butterbean escapes from the dog park to go find Walt. Second Floor Biscuit provides the distraction to let Butterbean escape.
Mrs. Food and Madison are super upset that Butterbean and Walt are missing.
Oscar is a little sad to be left behind and unable to help look for Walt, but when he sees how sad Mrs. Food is about Butterbean, he knows that he is needed in his cage.
The woman keeping the kidnapped cats at her house doesn’t feed them or let them out of the kennel. They manage to escape the kennel when they need to. The white cat needs a litterbox, and is disgusted/embarrassed when she has to go behind the couch. In the end, her anger at the kidnapper leads to the white cat moving her behind the couch treasure into position for the robot vacuum to move around.
The woman kidnapper intends to keep all the ransom money for herself and dump the white cat somewhere.
Butterbean, Polo, white cat, Walt, and Outside Biscuit attempt to drive the kidnapper’s car. After all, how hard could it be? After many attempts of coordinating themselves, they wind up hitting a parked car. The white cat has Butterbean wag her now bandage free tail everywhere to scatter blood and create a crime scene. The cats push the alarm button on the car keys which gathers enough attention for the police to arrive.
The police take the cats home.
Marco finds out from Leia that Mr. Hal is the Plant Man that lives in the Strathmore building and he is one of the kidnappers. Oscar uses his language skills to say Mr. Hal enough times that the white cat’s human realizes that Mr. Hal is a kidnapper.
Carmen (the police officer that lives in the Strathmore building) goes with Mrs. Food and the white cat’s human to see if Mr. Hal is home. In the end, they catch him with the ransom money bag.
Outside Biscuit helps Butterbean and Polo find their way back to the dog park. Butterbean is whisked back to the apartments by Second Floor Biscuit’s mom. Since Polo was clinging to Butterbean’s tummy, she went home too.
Madison and Mrs. Food are relieved and happy to see Butterbean and Walt again.
Mrs. Food’s animals are happy to be reunited again.

Other Books in Series (At Time of Posting):

Book One – The Great Pet Heist (review)
Book Two – The Great Ghost Hoax (review)
Book Three – The Great Vandal Scandal (review)

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