Mummy Cat

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Synopsis

Every hundred years, Mummy Cat awakens to prowl the halls of the pyramid in search of his beloved mistress, Queen Hat-shup-set, who died when he did. He hopes that this will finally be the time that she'll join him again. As young readers follow the little cat's journey, beautiful murals painted on the walls with embedded hieroglyphics tell a story within a story of the cat's and his queen's lives and deaths.

Review

Mummy Cat is a stand-alone children's book about a little cat who lived a good life in Ancient Egypt as the favored pet of the girl queen, Hat-shup-set. However, he died alongside her while trying unsuccessfully to save her from a scorpion bite. The pair were then mummified and entombed in a pyramid. Every hundred years, he rises from his death sleep to prowl the pyramid, hoping that this will finally be the time that his best friend, Hat-shup-set, joins him again.

I recall when I came across Mummy Cat that it looked like a cute story and there's much to recommend it. There's a sweetness in the mummy cat's loyalty to his mistress. He was her faithful pet in life, attempted to save her from death, and in the afterlife, he still keeps searching for her. It also includes a bit of the culture of Ancient Egypt, which is a great stepping stone for children to learn about this period in time. At the end of the story, there are brief explanations of Egyptian burial practices, the importance of cats in their culture, and a little about Queen Hatshepsut, who the author says was the inspiration for the fictional Queen Hat-shup-set. The illustrations also cleverly embed hieroglyphics within them and there's a legend at the end of the book to help readers translate them. I have to admit that I was so focused on the cat's story on my first read-through that I didn't even realize the treachery and betrayal that takes place, leading to the death of the young queen and her cat until I was reading the hieroglyphics and paying more attention to the murals on the pyramid's walls, so kudos to the author and illustrator for cleverly including those and giving me a bit of a surprise.

All that said, though, the story is a fairly simple one that didn't quite grab me in a way that will likely make it a memorable one. I also had some mild reservations about the suitability of the subject matter for its intended audience. While there's nothing inherently scary about the story, it does explore themes of death, the afterlife, and murder. I'm a proponent of kids being able to process difficult topics through the safe lens of a fictional story, but parents, guardians, and educators should be aware that kids may have questions about these things after reading this book so they can be prepared to answer. Overall, though, Mummy Cat is a cute story that I enjoyed reading even if it didn't quite hit keeper status for me.

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Marcus Ewert @ GoodReads

Lisa Brown