• PARENT REVIEW
• EDUCATOR REVIEW

We first met hypochondriac, serial exaggerator, and kvetcher, Ike LaRue, Mrs. LaRue’s melodramatic black and white terrier, when he was “imprisoned” at the posh Igor Brotweiler Canine Academy, where he had been sent for a two month term in Dear Mrs. LaRue: Letters from Obedience School. In this, his second adventure, he's a suspect in some feline foul play—the police are holding him as a suspect in the disappearance of neighbor Mrs. Hibbins' two cats. Told by Ike in the text of the letters he sends his vacationing owner, Mrs. LaRue, he sets out to find the bad cats—whom he has linked to a string of canary and bird thefts all over town—and to clear his own name.

Note that the two sets of illustrations on each page, one in lush acrylics, the other in hard-boiled black and white, tell the story from two very different viewpoints. As Ike says, "Of course, the color pictures are just a bit of comic relief—trust me, the black and white ones reveal the true drama." Or do they? Readers will want to discuss and debate who is telling the whole truth—Ike, or the police and the newspapers, and speculate on how the two cats might tell their side of the story. And just in time for Election Day, there’s LaRue for Mayor: Letters from the Campaign Trail, where the police chief of Snort City, Hugo Bugwort, is running for mayor on a law-and-order platform, promising to “crack down on the beasts.” Dirty tricks abound when Ike throws his hat into the ring.

Reviewed by JF.

Themes: CATS. DOGS. HUMOR. MYSTERY & DETECTIVE STORIES.

We first met hypochondriac, serial exaggerator, and kvetcher, Ike LaRue, Mrs. LaRue’s melodramatic black and white terrier, when he was “imprisoned” at the posh Igor Brotweiler Canine Academy, where he had been sent for a two month term in Dear Mrs. LaRue: Letters from Obedience School. In this, his second adventure, he's a suspect in some feline foul play—the police are holding him as a suspect in the disappearance of neighbor Mrs. Hibbins' two cats. Told by Ike in the text of the letters he sends his vacationing owner, Mrs. LaRue, he sets out to find the bad cats—whom he has linked to a string of canary and bird thefts all over town—and to clear his own name.

Note that the two sets of illustrations on each page, one in lush acrylics, the other in hard-boiled black and white, tell the story from two very different viewpoints. As Ike says, "Of course, the color pictures are just a bit of comic relief—trust me, the black and white ones reveal the true drama." Or do they? Readers will want to discuss and debate who is telling the whole truth—Ike, or the police and the newspapers, and speculate on how the two cats might tell their side of the story. And just in time for Election Day, there’s LaRue for Mayor: Letters from the Campaign Trail, where the police chief of Snort City, Hugo Bugwort, is running for mayor on a law-and-order platform, promising to “crack down on the beasts.” Dirty tricks abound when Ike throws his hat into the ring.

Reviewed by JF.

Themes: CATS. DOGS. HUMOR. MYSTERY & DETECTIVE STORIES.