Booklist (July 2014 (Vol. 110, No. 21))
Grades K-2. When Mr. Button brings home a dog, and Mrs. Button brings home a cat, the two very different pets have to learn to share a room together. In a cute spin on a dorm-room situation, the two greet each other cordially, but soon their idiosyncrasies begin to grate on each other. Cat has no interest in chasing tails. Dog is not a fan of Cat’s indoor bathroom habits. And what’s up with Dog sniffing everything and Cat clawing everything? Gall has a field day with his comic colored-pencil art, offering so much to laugh at that it’s hard to keep up: Dog’s frat-house sloppiness, Cat’s rack of identical jackets, Dog’s iBone device, and more. After a phase of sabotage (Cat hacking hairballs into Dog’s bowl, etc.), the two rejoin forces when a third character arrives, louder and stinkier than either of them: a baby. This final plot swerve feels a touch extraneous, but that doesn’t take away from the giggly joy anyone will get from these odd bedfellows. A second round would be welcome.
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