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35th out of 91 books
—
545 voters
Highway Cats
When three kittens are carelessly thrown off the back of a truck, none of the highway cats know what to make of them. They seem to have some sort of appeal?an energy, even?that Khalia Koo, Jolly Roger and the rest of the mangy, feral cats don?t understand. But there are bigger issues to figure out when the bulldozers start coming, threatening to demolish the cats? homes as...more
Hardcover, 112 pages
Published
September 18th 2008
by Philomel
(first published 2008)
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I don't quite know what to think about this book -- it's probably the most peculiar animal story I've read in a while, and that includes Kathy Appelt's The Underneath.
(thinks for a moment)
No, it probably ties with The Underneath for peculiarity. However: Highway Cats is more tightly written, and I feel that it probably has broader appeal. I'd have no qualms giving this to younger readers.
The story revolves around a group of rough-and-tumble cats living in an abandoned lot, and how their lives a...more
(thinks for a moment)
No, it probably ties with The Underneath for peculiarity. However: Highway Cats is more tightly written, and I feel that it probably has broader appeal. I'd have no qualms giving this to younger readers.
The story revolves around a group of rough-and-tumble cats living in an abandoned lot, and how their lives a...more
The story of a bunch of rough and crude highway cats, turned from spitting and hissing loners into a community of hope by the strange arrival of three kittens.
One night on the highway while waiting for their next meal to be tossed from a moving vehicle the highway cats witness a new arrival. A man in a truck screeches to a halt nearby and drops of a cardboard box containing three kittens.
The kittens have a rough time of it at first. They are caged at Kahlia Koo's rat farm and used by Koo and her...more
One night on the highway while waiting for their next meal to be tossed from a moving vehicle the highway cats witness a new arrival. A man in a truck screeches to a halt nearby and drops of a cardboard box containing three kittens.
The kittens have a rough time of it at first. They are caged at Kahlia Koo's rat farm and used by Koo and her...more
Three seemingly magical kittens are tossed out of a car near the highway within sight of a band of Highway Cats. Their mystical blue aura is a beacon of sorts to the weary, seasoned cats who are tired of a hard life. When man's bulldozers threaten to overtake their little slice of the forest, these kittens appear to change fate in favor of all highway wildlife. The mayor is not pleased at the interruptions of the highway's progress, but finally listens to the hysterics of the construction worker...more
May 02, 2013
♒ᙅĦɐﬡ☂єℓℓᙓ♒
rated it
1 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
no
Shelves:
713-y-childrens-713,
00713-own-pb-or-hb-00713
★Highway Cats by Janet Taylor Lisle
So I don't even know where to begin, with this one. We did not like this one at all. My daughter is a huge cat lover, and I don't mind them. Knowing this, her classmates picked this book for her while she was incredibly sick. One of the local business' brought in a book for every third grader, to have. I am very glad, we did not pay for this, or I would be mad. It was all I could do, to even get her to sit and listen to it.
(view spoiler)...more
So I don't even know where to begin, with this one. We did not like this one at all. My daughter is a huge cat lover, and I don't mind them. Knowing this, her classmates picked this book for her while she was incredibly sick. One of the local business' brought in a book for every third grader, to have. I am very glad, we did not pay for this, or I would be mad. It was all I could do, to even get her to sit and listen to it.
(view spoiler)...more
This was an amazing story. Very enjoyable to read Ever word was in the right place for a perfect book. I must admit, I didn't have high hopes for it, because the author, Janet T Lisle, had left me disappointing before in one of her previous books, "Afternoon of the Elves" Though that book was great to read, as soon as I got to the end I "threw it at the wall". The ending left me full of disgust. It just....ended. That is similar to what happened here. Although I must say I like "The Highway Cats...more
Three tiny kittens are abandoned in the center median strip of a busy highway and miraculously cross four lanes of highway to a scraggly woods inhabited by feral cats who live by foraging for throwaway food (dumpster diving and highway trash). Somehow the kittens bring the cats together, softening their rough edges. They work together, an unheard of activity, to keep a freeway on-ramp from being built through their woods, something the mayor wants to build so he'll be reelected. As an adult, I k...more
Cute cat story. The blurb bills this as a "modern fable". Basically a bunch of wild cats eke out a living in a small patch of woods beside a highway. When the mayor decides to bulldoze the woods in order to build an exit ramp to get to a nearby shopping mall, they rebel. Their inspiration is a group of mysterious kittens who are abandoned by the side of the road one day and rescued by a crusty old cat named Shredder. There's something unusual about the kittens: they seem to glow, and they don't...more
Hmmm. Are these cats extra-terrestrials, or magical, or angel kitties, or...what? That's the only thing I didn't really like about this book. Clearly, there was some weirdness over in the kitty area, but it was never explained. (Unless I slept through that paragraph, in which case, someone explain it to me, please.)
The characters of Shredder and Khalia Khoo were my clear favorites. I might have liked the kitties, but we never got to know them (intentional, I am sure). Jolly Roger and Murray the...more
The characters of Shredder and Khalia Khoo were my clear favorites. I might have liked the kitties, but we never got to know them (intentional, I am sure). Jolly Roger and Murray the...more
This is the 2nd of 15 SSYRA books for 3rd to 5th graders that I'll be reading this summer. This is the story of a group of stray cats and an oddly magical litter of kittens that appear suddenly and are nurtured by the older cats. The mayor of the town where the cats live wants to put a highway through the woods where the cats live, so they join together to stop him. This was a quick read, though I really didn't enjoy it- as evidenced by my two star rating. Young readers who like books told from...more
Two and a half stars: my rating hangs between "It was okay" and "I liked it." What a strange little story! At one point, I thought that the kittens were aliens (and maybe I still think that could be the explanation!). I've never come across Lisle's books before, so I didn't quite know what to expect. At least the somewhat-anthropomorphized animals in this story are not too cute, and they have a few interesting character details. A cat who runs a rat meat factory, and who wears a margarine tub wi...more
Mar 09, 2010
Sarah
rated it
3 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Recommends it for:
grades 4-6
Recommended to Sarah by:
5/6 list
Shelves:
children-animal-fiction,
audio
Shredder, a grizzled old cat, discovers three abandoned kittens on the highway he lives near. Miraculously, the kittens survive crossing the busy lanes. At first, Shredder and the other feral cats don’t much care for these seemingly helpless kittens, but they soon warm to their innocence in the face of life in the wild.
Meanwhile, the mayor of the town has plans to build ramps leading to and from the highway—ramps that would run right through the woods in which the cats live. Because the arrival...more
Meanwhile, the mayor of the town has plans to build ramps leading to and from the highway—ramps that would run right through the woods in which the cats live. Because the arrival...more
The highway cats are a mean, scraggly, tough bunch. You know these cats are bad when they respond to a box of kittens being left beside the highway by betting on which ones, if any, will make it across the busy roadway without being splatted by a truck. Strangely enough, all three kittens do make it across the road and a rumor starts that they’re miracle kittens. Soon, even stranger things are happening. Under the kittens’ influence, the highway cats actually start cleaning up themselves and the...more
Extremely disappointing. I loved Lisle's Afternoon of the Elves, which is a powerful book even when read as an adult, but Highway Cats has absolutely none of the same enjoyment. Lisle's story is muddy and floundering. She famed the cats' story narrative with quick two-page slices of human story written in inexplicable script format, and I just... why?
The juxtaposition of script to prose and back again repeatedly without any reason whatsoever would render any story poorly written, but the prose p...more
The juxtaposition of script to prose and back again repeatedly without any reason whatsoever would render any story poorly written, but the prose p...more
Three kiddens arrive, or rather survive on the road, to help save a scrawny patch of woods from retail development and energize the colony of cats who live there to take a stand. It's all very mysterious what happens... This book (written for juveniles) reads like a very mild Carl Hiaasen novel, with a strong bent to making politicians look greedy and ridiculous, but I don't think it succeeds in communicating the point of environmental conservation to children. (Is that the point? Well, it's all...more
It’s a hard life for the feral cats by the side of the highway. Their home is threatened when a mayor seeking reelection decides to build a freeway ramp through their part of the woods. The arrival of three developmentally disabled kittens ends up softening the hard hearts of the scrappy cats. I couldn’t get myself to care about any of the characters, despite deft portrayals. The changing attitudes of the cats, as influenced by the three kittens, were unconvincing. The three kittens themselves w...more
OK, I can handle 'talking' cats just fine as in Shirley Rousseau Murphy's mysteries and Erin Hunter's series but here the fantasy was just too fantastic to be believed. If Lisle had not stepped over the line quite so far this could have been a cute story with some mystical overtones about a group of cats cleverly outwitting the humans to save their little bit of Nature. Parts about the spirit of some of the abused strays was quite moving. I wanted to like this more than I did.
Feb 16, 2009
Gail
rated it
5 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
Jennifer
Shelves:
caldecott-newbury-winners
An excellent read. Geared towards young adults, (I would read it with 4th or 5th graders for Guided Reading with no problems) it brings together a rag-tag group of feral/abandoned cats, who must face possible eviction from their small area of wilderness due to an encroaching highway ramp for a strip mall.
Engaging and thought provoking, without being saccharine. Will draw in both boys and girls (not always an easy task). Worthy of a Newbery Honor.
Engaging and thought provoking, without being saccharine. Will draw in both boys and girls (not always an easy task). Worthy of a Newbery Honor.
This is a book dealing with environmental issues, and also about older cats trying to be mentors for the young ones. This could apply to people, as well. There is an aura about three little kittens that get dumped by the roadside. Written through a combination of play script, newspaper articles and colorful narrative writing, Janet Taylor Lisle has created a high-spirited modern fable. It is, of course, a juvenile fiction book.
I'm not really sure who this book would be good for, other than cat lovers. It's part of the elementary SSYRA 2009-2010 books. While I put human characteristics on all my animals, I thought this one was a bit far-fetched (the glowing kittens) and I don't think that it explained the glowing-ness of the kittens or why they were there or where they went....is this part of a series and I stepped in the middle? I kinda felt that way...
This is a fun animal fantasy. Three innocent kittens join a band of wild cats living on the side of a highway. The cats have lived on food they've pick out of dumpsters and that has been thrown out of cars. All of the cats have become grungy and dispirited from living outside. When the kittens arrive on the scene, they give a newfound enthusiasm to the old cats, who band together to take care of them.
This is a fun animal fantasy. Three innocent kittens join a band of wild cats living on the side of a highway. The cats have lived on food they've pick out of dumpsters and that has been thrown out of cars. All of the cats have become grungy and dispirited from living outside. When the kittens arrive on the scene, they give a newfound enthusiasm to the old cats, who band together to take care of them.
A resounding "no, thanks" from me. Admittedly, I never would have picked this up ordinarily, and it fulfilled all the things I expect "animal books" to be (by which I mean that I don't care for "animal books"). But I didn't think the writing was great, especially the dialogue; I never stopped feeling like I was reading a play, because the words seemed sort of lifeless, waiting for someone to speak them. Most of the things I thought were funny seemed primarily aimed at adults. And I had doubts ab...more
Three tiny kittens are abandoned along a highway, and found by several stray cats. The kittens quickly becomes the favorites of the scraggly bunch of lost cats, but their fate is threatened by a construction project that will destroy the small woods that is their home. With some quick thinking and a little bit of magic, can the cats save themselves and the kittens?
It wasn't the best cat book I've read. Indeed, Janet keeps you thinking these cats have some strange and mystical power when in the end their 'power' isn't revealed. The ending left me a little confused, but it was still a great and quick read. I did enjoy the scenes with Khalia Koo - she was an epic character to read about.
What a charming little book. I think it has the same issues we've been wondering about in The Underneath. There was cruelty and brutality and it was horrifying in parts. The redemptive moments so outweighed the horror, though. What a great story about teamwork and love.
I no longer have this book (I ended up giving it away) but I most certainly remember the story. It's hard to say exactly what I think of it. But I can definitely say that its certainly a very unusual story and I've never read any like it.
A cute story about cats who live in the woods and are pretty beat up. They find a couple of kitties discarded on the highway that seem to have some "magical" powers which provide a beacon of light to the mangy homeless cats.
Stray cats located just off the highway, come across some magical litter of kittens. They all band together to save their habitat when the local mayor decides to build an exit ramp for the new highway thru it. Good
It may be a short book and I finished it in 20 minutes, but it was really cute! I got into it and laughed at the part where the cats put garbage on their heads and attacked the humans. My favorite cat was Shredder!
Apr 14, 2010
Serra
is currently reading it
Highway Cats has taught me that when something new comes around,you've got to help it even if it isn't your type.Things might seem blind at first but you'll notice there in myour nway for a certain reason.
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