The Mostly True Story of Pudding Tat, Adventuring Cat
The Mostly True Story of Pudding Tat, Adventuring Cat
By then, Pudding had woken from his nap and was washing, too, among the lilies. He heard the same irresistible strains from the organ.
“Wrong direction,” the flea said when Pudding set out to follow the music. “Hello, are you even listening? The hotels are thataway”
So beautiful and complicated! The organ was a tapestry of sound! The flea kept harping, working himself up to a conniption, until he saw the Temple of Music with its fluttering flags and its blue dome encrusted in gold.
The most majestic hotel so far.
“Yes here!” he shouted. “I’m home!”
Inside, President McKinley had just welcomed the two thousand seated spectators. Now he turned to greet the hundreds of people who had lined up to shake his hand.
He was a portly man, dressed in a long coat, his trademark red carnation pinned to his lapel. The president had practically been elected on his hand shaking. He could grip and squeeze fifty hands a minute and leave everyone feeling special.
Squeeze, shake, how d’ee do? They flowed past, the beautiful American people. All colors, sizes and shapes.
Pudding Tat was born in 1901 on an Ontario farm. A gentle cat, he was albino… pure white with pink eyes that saw very little. He was named after a special dessert the cats were given occasionally, and Pudding was an object of fascination for the farmer’s son, little Johnnie Willoughby. For Mother Tat, Pudding’s future was a worry... how could he avoid predators and how could he catch mice when he could not see?
Encouraged by a flea that lives in Pudding’s ear and has delusions of grandeur, the cat says goodbye to his mother and sets out to see the world. He is by nature a timid, music loving cat with no great ambition. And yet somehow, he and his parasitic flea, who becomes Pudding’s visual guide, always seem to be at the center of major events. They go over Niagara Falls in a barrel with Annie Edison Taylor, the first woman to attempt the feat, they see President McKinley shot, live in New York with a well-known composer, voyage on an airship, sail on the Titanic and find themselves in a trench in World War I where Pudding’s old friend Johnny is fighting. When Johnny is wounded, he brings Pudding and his resident flea back to the farm where it all began.
The Mostly True Story of Pudding Tat, Adventuring Cat is a beautifully told tongue-in-cheek story, the ‘mostly true’ in the title and the author’s afterword a warning that a few liberties with the exact historical truth have been taken! It is an inventive and creative tale, the unassuming cat and his go-getter pushy flea being unlikely heroes! As adventurers, they often find themselves in tense situations, but they also have happy times. The fact they end up so many years later where it all began is a lovely and satisfying conclusion to Pudding’s adventures. This mixture of history and animal fantasy by an award-winning author is an involving read that children will enjoy. The Mostly True Story of Pudding Tat, Adventuring Cat would also make a great title for librarians and teachers to use in booktalks.
Aileen Wortley is a retired Children’s Librarian living in Toronto, Ontario.