FAT CHANCE Deborah Kogan Ray HB/1ST blind cat farm girl

(image of actual item)

Marty Louise finds a blind stray
cat and worries that her mother
will not let her keep him.

FROM THE DUST JACKET:

Letters are the one prickly, barbed thing Marty Louise can't do at school. She can't even write her own name. So when she is at home recovering from an illness, instead of practicing her letters, she befriends a blind, half-starved cat she discovers in her yard. "Chancy," she calls him.

"Fat chance you have of keeping him," her brother Derek, taunts her. "Mom hates cats."

But lonely Marty wants her very own friend more than anything, so she sneaks out to pet and feed the stray cat. When her mother finds out, Marty is surprised by her reaction; but she is even more surprised when together Chancy and her mother help Marty discover her own name in a wonderful new way.

The earthy watercolor illustrations of painter Deborah Kogan Ray, together with Lady Borton's sensitive telling, make a lasting poignant story of one little girl's struggle to master one of the most important tasks of childhood, and the friendship that helps her achieve it.

Author Lady Borton lives on a farm in Appalachian Ohio, which she has shared over the years with a number of children and many animals, including the animals in this story: Wobbly Dog, Shirley She-Goat, and Fat Chance, a real blind cat with a stump for a leg.

Painter Deborah Kogan Ray has written and illustrated many honored books for children, among them the ALA Noteable Book My Prairie Year.

Nature and a sense of time and place are often the inspiration for Deborah's work. The gentle hills of her beloved "second home," eastern Maine, are the inspiration for Fat Chance.

Deborah studied painting at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts.

From School Library Journal:

Marty must stay home from school because of rheumatic fever, but she doesn't really feel sick, except about learning her letters. She would like to adopt a stray cat that wanders into the farmyard, but Mother always says, "'No cats!'"

As the child approaches the animal with milk, she realizes that it has only three legs and is blind. "'Fat chance you have a living'...", she says. From there, it is "'fat chance of'" petting the cat, "'fat chance of'" hiding it, of training it, etc. But Marty persists and succeeds, and in the end her mother is won over.

This is a pleasant story with a comforting tone, enhanced by soft pencil illustrations. Marty and Chancy are both lonely and lacking in confidence, but together they help one another. Borton has taken the standard elements of friendship, pets, and helping the underdog and blended them into a comfortable story based in reality without undue moral or emotional tugging.

The days grew longer. Marty trained Wobbly Lion
[the dog] to sit. Chancy Tiger learned to circle
Marty's ankles. When Shirley She-goat gave birth
to twins, Marty added the kids to her circus.

Please check my other listings -- I will combine shipping charges.

DISCLAIMER:

Information presented in this description is accurate and takes precedence over any misinformation included in eBay's pre-filled data.