As with the first one, I saw nothing particularly special here. Yes, I'm not the target market, but I will absolutely enjoy a good kid's book when presented with one. Go find his Nobody is Perfick instead, which I think is brilliant and charming.

(Note: 5 stars = amazing, wonderful, 4 = very good book, 3 = decent read, 2 = disappointing, 1 = awful, just awful. I'm fairly good at picking for myself so end up with a lot of 4s). ( )

This is a basically inoffensive book in the Lyle the Crocodile series. But it's too long and the plot too convuluted to be a good picture book. Mr. Grump is a "scrooge" around Christmas. His cat, Loretta, gets fed up with him and runs away. A "cat lady" finds Loretta, adopts her, and moves her in with her plethora of other felines, and Loretta immediately decides she wants to go home. Meanwhile Lyle has been enjoying the Christmas season but is worried about Mr. Grump. He tries to help Mr. Grump find Loretta by doing another character's job (cleaning houses) as he looks for Loretta (?). The owner of the house that Lyle's cleaning freaks out that a crocodile is cleaning her house and has Lyle arrested. It all resolves happily, of course, before Lyle can go to jail.

See what I mean about convuluted? The book is only peripherally about Christmas, as well, which sort of seems like false advertising. But Lyle is cute and the uncomplicated friendship he exhibits to his neighbors and their pets is kind of adorable. ( )

Lyle has friends who is loves and its Christmas time. Mr.Grumps is having a case of the blahs but then his cat Loretta runs away. He becomes ven sadder and so are all of Lyle's friends. They all work together to find Loretta. Prunella, the cat lady, finds Loretta and takes her home but Loretta wants to go back to Mr. Grumps. Lyle sees his old dance partner, Hector, and asks about Loretta. Hector saw Loretta with Prunella and he leaves to get her. Lyle stays behind to finish cleaning the home Hector was working at. When the Worthmores come home they call the police and Hector is arrested for breaking in their home. All of his friends come to court to save him and the charges are dropped. They all went to Mr. Grumps on Christmas Eve for dinner.