Cat's Eye View

• Date: 12.11.2007
• Book: Blitzcat
• Author: TCRH

Review

A grand panorama of Britain at war through the eyes of a cat.

It takes a writer at the top of his game to turn that premise into a stirring reality. Thankfully Westall, one of the foremost children's writers of the late twentieth century, was brimming with confidence when he tackled Blitzcat. He was rarely more effective as writer than he is here.

Combining two of his favourite themes, the Second World War and our feline friends, Westall created one of his most vivid and appealing novels.

Never shying from some complex themes - adultery borne from the unreality of new situations, the fear and superstitions of new recruits, death, grief and violence - Westall takes the titular feline on an epic journey.

From the carnage of Coventry's blitz through the drama of occupied France to the choking loneliness and grief of a widow's cottage in the moors, this is a broad sweep at an all consuming conflict.

Yet somehow the reader is drawn into this world. Westall resists the temptation to turn Blitzcat into a Disneyfied cartoon. This cat is selfish, determined and willing to give only if the rewards are worth it.

Yet she shares a universal yearning: in times of conflict and upheaval, when nothing seems real, all she wants, like the soldiers at the front and the families at home, is for normality to reign.

This book deserves to be read for generations: not only as a tribute to Westall but as an introduction to a conflict that shaped the way we live today.