Customer Reviews

Charlie Anderson

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This simple, yet intricate tale of a cat named Charlie and Anderson can help children of divorced parents relate to life. In it a cat has two homes, two set of owners and one big family that loves him a lot. He doesn't mind having to visit between them and he gets different kinds of love shown him at each house. So it makes him extra special. The two little girls who discover their cat actually has another home he visits during the day, slowly realize that although their parents live in separate houses still love them the same as if they did live together. It's straight forward approach and fuzzy, cuddly cat makes this book a unique approach to talking to your children about divorce. I recommend it highly being a divorced parent of a cat lover.

This wondrously illustrated and engaging picture book is simple enough and so thought-provoking that it makes the pangs of divorce a little less traumatic. With its feline hero, "intelligently" bouncing from one loved home to the next, the child can easily make a connection with a real-life scenario.

The book was presented to me in a grad class and I am thankful to the instructor for its introduction.

Thus, the recommendation is being passed on to the customers at Amazon with the hopes that they, too, will want to make this book a part of their children's collection.

This is a wonderful story about a cat, Charlie, who saunters into the life of two girls. One stormy night, Charlie doesn't come home and the girls make a surprising discovery. They learn that having two homes and two families that love you can be pretty great! The illustrations are fabulous and capture the personality of the cat. You will fall in love with Charlie!

Two families that live on opposite sides of the woods think they "own" a cat. One calls him Charlie, one calls him Anderson. Just like the two sisters that live on one side of the woods, Charlie has two homes where he is loved very much. This is a great way to explain that just because two households are very different the love can be just as strong in both.

Many children can relate to this simple and beautifully illustrated story. Two young girls, Elizabeth and Sarah discover a secret about their cat, Charlie Anderson, when he doesn't return home one stormy night. Charlie has TWO homes. He stays with them during the night and spends the day with another family. Both families dearly love and care for the cat. The two families realize that Charlie Anderson should be shared because of their mutual love for him.

A Note for Teachers: This is a wonderful book to read to children when discussing the family units. Children of divorce and separation can quickly identify with Charlie Anderson. Just like Charlie, children can find reassurance that they are still very much loved even though they are shared by two families.

Can you love two families? That should be the subtitle of this modern tale of American life. A gray cat walks out of the woods one afternoon and into the lives of Elizabeth and Sarah and their mother. He makes himself at home and they welcome him into their hearts.

They call this gray, striped cat Charlie. His most distinguishing feature is his loud purr during the night. His other is his disappearance every morning back into the woods. On occasion they want to take him with them to the city for the weekend with their father and step-mother, but their mother convinces them he is a country cat.

One afternoon when a thunderstorm comes, Charlie does not come home. The girls are sick with worry. The next day they traipse the surrounding area looking for Charlie. They find him at the house across the woods from their house. There he is Anderson. After the two families realize the cat is one and the same, they rename him Charlie Anderson and keep the arrangement. After all, it was Charlie's idea.

The one untuned chord in this nice, little story is the question Elizabeth asks him one night in the dark: "Who do you love best, Charlie Anderson?"

For our family, the lovely soft watercolored illustrations were the best feature of this sweet, yet unsurprising story. The illustrations evoke a time before step-families were commonplace, and though the text refers to watching TV, the pictures present a world where bad things only happen in books.

This is a wonderful book for children that are living through a divorce. It is a sweet story of a cat that lives with two families and has two different names. The families decide to name him Charlie Anderson. He is one lucky cat because he has two families that love and care for him.This might help a child to see that having two families isn't so bad after all.

My 10 y/o daughter received Charlie Anderson several years ago for a present. We read it over and over, identifying with the book because we are also cat lovers. Charlie Anderson gave my daughter a sense of what it is like to love a pet and be responsible for its well-being. In addition to a wonderfully told story, the illustrations are beautiful watercolors you will enjoy looking at again and again. Even though my daughter is a little bigger now, Charlie Anderson is still talked about in our house. A new cat here will surely be named Charlie Anderson.

I found this story sweet and touching. Charlie Anderson makes kids feel better about going back and forth between two homes.... and through a cat! It's a lovely story with a very nurturing ending. This is an important and relevant book to today's youth. The only bummer is that there are not more books out there like Charlie Anderson. The message is that you can love two families. So powerful!