School Library Journal Review
PreS-Gr 1-An old woman and her two cats live quietly on a small farm where she is especially good at growing cabbages. Then one day, half of her crop mysteriously disappears. Elsie resolves to find the culprit, but, in the end, it is her pets that set things right, and expand her circle of friends in the process. The watercolor illustrations are a perfect accompaniment to the text. Kids will love being in on the joke when they see what destroyed the cabbages long before the woman does (rabbits). One particularly funny page shows Elsie's reaction to her decimated field: the stately text, "For a moment, she lost control," is set against a trio of pictures of Elsie in full tantrum mode. The evocative, muted tones set the mood as surely as the expressive faces on Oller's characters, both human and animal. An ideal addition to storytime, and a tale destined to be enjoyed by a wide audience.-Kathleen Kelly MacMillan, Maryland School for the Deaf, Columbia (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Publisher's Weekly Review
A reclusive farmer named Elsie can't seem to stop a mystery marauder from decimating her famous cabbage patch. After she fails at keeping sentry, Elsie's formidable cats, Fluff and Gordo, take on the role of enforcers, catch a gang of rabbits in the act and compel them to return all their booty to Elsie's doorstep. When Elsie spots them, she invites them in for soup; they join the household and help her cultivate cabbages of renown. "Her life was no longer so simple, and she liked it that way." In her first book as both writer and illustrator, greeting-card artist Oller (Dogs, Dogs, Dogs!) makes wonderful use of her visual signature: rotund, soulful characters who seem to materialize from clouds and puffs of watercolor. While there's deliberate humor in the plodding movements of Elsie and the squat imperiousness of Fluff and Gordo, Oller communicates that their considerable girths contain immense reserves of feeling and purpose. Her storytelling, however, lacks the same control. The text, while not long, contains extraneous phrases and seems to wander to its rather pat conclusion. Ages 4-up. (Feb.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved