Fuse 8 n’ Kate: Bad Kitty by Nick Bruel
April is National Autism Acceptance Month, so Kate asked me to bring her an appropriate book. Our usual rule is that we only consider books that are 20+ years old. The trouble is that most of the best books on the topic of the autistic spectrum were created within the last two decades. So we’re cheating a bit this week and going with something produced in 2005 (a whole year too early, by our usual standards). And rather than go the direct route, I am selecting a book that has been embraced by autistic child readers as containing an autistic character, even if she was not originally conceived of in that matter. In this episode we celebrate the rare four-alphabet-combo (most picture books are lucky to get just one), discuss what kind of grocery story provides (amongst other things) opossum, and my undying love and affection for Uncle Murray.
Listen to the whole show here on Soundcloud or download it through iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify, Google Play, PlayerFM, Audible, Amazon Music, or your preferred method of podcast selection.
Show Notes:
I kid you not, Woodstock, Illinois is adorable. And if you choose to go there, be sure you stay at the Cherry Tree Inn. It’s a delight.
Here is what Nick had to say about autism and Bad Kitty.
Right off the bat, Kate notices that while Bad Kitty may draw herself on the wall, she does so with whiskers. But Bad Kitty, as we all know, does not HAVE whiskers!
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Kate also noticed that a lot of these “healthy” food items would kill your cat, including onions, garlic, and leeks. No wonder Kitty freaks out!!
I do love that Nick Bruel got the Xigua in this book from Lois Ehlert’s Eating the Alphabet.
This was a very early Bad Kitty. So the “snarly tooth” that Kate identifies, comes and goes, eventually disappearing entirely in the future.
Not so sure about the old lady shoes on the girls here.
Shall we give Nick Bruel full credit for having Kitty sing opera when there is a famous opera singer named Kitty Whately?
Kate Recommends: Chicago Autism Project
Betsy Recommends: No lie, folks. My book really is getting a full weekend celebration (sorta) AND a parade! And if you’re in the area in Michigan in late July, join me! We’ll make a day of it!
Filed under: Fuse 8 n' Kate
About Betsy Bird
Betsy Bird is currently the Collection Development Manager of the Evanston Public Library system and a former Materials Specialist for New York Public Library. She has served on Newbery, written for Kirkus, and has done other lovely little things that she'd love to tell you about but that she's sure you'd find more interesting to hear of in person. Her opinions are her own and do not reflect those of EPL, SLJ, or any of the other acronyms you might be able to name. Follow her on BlueSky at: @fuse8.bsky.social
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Hi, Betsy and Kate!
As you predicted, I can’t help myself and I’m going to respond. To begin… thank you. I thought/hoped that you might cover “Bad Kitty” next year when she actually does turn 20, but your jumping in early is a nice treat. Also thrilled that you designated the book a “classic”.
To address your few criticisms, I agree with ALL of them. First, I shouldn’t have made “rhubarb” the “U” vegetable and I shouldn’t have made “squash” the “Q”. Google was still in its infancy 22 years ago when I wrote this book, and I simply couldn’t find an appropriate veggie or fruit for those letters. Given the chance to go back in time and correct this, I would use “Quince” and maybe “Ugli fruit”.
By the way, can I point out something that very, very few people ever notice? For all of Kitty’s utterances during the first and third alphabets, I highlight the vowel, including “Y”. Almost no one has ever seen this, so that’s probably my shortcoming in not making it more obvious.
As for not using all caps for “GOOD”, well done in pointing this out. This makes me wince every time I read this book out loud to a group of kids. This was only my second book and back in the day I was simply not as forceful in pointing out the errors to my publisher’s designer. I did, in fact, point this out to her a couple times when she showed me proofs, but the corrections were never made and I simply didn’t push hard enough. I regret it.
“Xigua” is mandarin, so it would be pronounced “Shee-gua”.
There actually is consistency with that tooth. It appears when Kitty is being bad or about to be bad, as with the first alphabet, but not when she is being good. (I would do this one other time for “Poor Puppy”, its sequel.) But I’ll confess that I probably wasn’t as consistent as I should have been with every illustration. Still, you don’t see that tooth at all during the last two alphabets but then it reappears on the very last page. That’s how we know that Kitty is about to be BAD again.
As for a tv show… stay tuned.
Oof! Well, if we dish it out then we need to take it. Thank you for the xigua correction. I should have looked that up before our recording, since I knew ahead of time that it was something I wanted to discuss. And that was MY point about the tooth!! Glad we’re on the same page with that one.
Thanks for listening, Nick. And now I’m intrigued about that TV show…
Anytime, and thank you again. Please don’t think I’m correcting you. I completely agree with every flaw you guys noticed.
When Macmillan hired Vanessa Williams to make an audio read aloud of the book, she decided to give “Xigua” a Hispanic pronunciation and pronounced it “Hee-gua”. Either no one at Macmillan had any idea of how it should be pronounced or simply chose not to correct her.