A hilarious book starring a Black two-dad family (still an unfortunate rarity in picture books), Bathe the Cat has a rhythm and silliness that will make kids want to read and reread.
The story opens with a two-dad, two-kid, one-cat family getting ready for Grandma’s arrival. Papa is trying to organize everyone to tidy and clean, so he makes a list with magnetic letters on the fridge, assigning tasks like “mop the floor,” “scrub the dishes,” “rock the baby,” and “feed the fishes.” Papa himself will “bathe the cat.”
The cat doesn’t want to be bathed, however. Without the humans’ knowledge, it scrambles the list with a paw so that the people get tasks like “feed the floor” and “sweep the dishes.” The family tries to comply, with chaotic results. This happens repeatedly as Papa gets increasingly agitated. He eventually fixes the list, though, smartly now ending it with “Rock the cat,” which the clever feline is all too happy to allow. The tasks are finished just in time for Grandma’s arrival.
The first printing of this book has Papa exclaiming at one point, “I’ve lost my marbles,” but the publisher has informed me that because of the ableist implications of the phrase (meaning that a person is acting “as if they have become insane”), they will be changing it to “This is ridiculous” in the next printing, likely available in summer or fall of 2022.
The text is just the right amount of bouncy, and works in harmony with the dynamic illustrations. The cat is sneaky and smug, and even the family’s goldfish have personality. There are signs of queer identity throughout: The fridge has rainbow flag, transgender flag, and an agender flag on it; Grandma’s purse has rainbow stripes with a pink triangle decoration. The story also adds to the happily growing number of LGBTQ-inclusive picture books in which the characters’ queerness is incidental to the plot, while still being clear.
