The Improbable Cat

Description

The story begins when a seemingly harmless kitten limps into the Burrell family's garden. The kitten gets bigger and bigger and soon the family, apart from the narrator David, are in thrall to the creature. They slowly descend into squalor and sloth as they are sucked into the service of the enormous black cat that has taken over their lives. Eventually David breaks the spell and sends in a pack of dogs to see off the cat, who makes a dramatic exit through the lounge window and is flattened by a passing truck.

In the early 1960s, Allan studied teacher training in Sunderland, where he also met Janet, his future wife. He had tackled a wide variety of jobs, ranging from postman to plumber's mate before working as a primary teacher for ten years. Janet, however, discovering that she 'couldn't do the policing job', went on to study graphic design, which led her to her vocation as an illustrator. Several years later, bored with her then current job, and desperate for a creative opening, Janet asked Allan to write a children's book for her to illustrate. Allan, having always wanted to write but being unable to find his niche, suddenly felt 'as though he was a clockwork toy and she had turned the key'. So began the career which would later lead them to become one of Britain's most successful author/illustrator teams, producing ingenious books of the highest quality. Influenced by comics and cartoons, their perfect partnership went on to produce masterpieces including PEEPO!, which reflected Allan's childhood ('I am the Peepo! baby.'), EACH PEACH PEAR PLUM and THE BABY'S CATALOGUE. These books have all become children's classics, with their 'rhythmic prose, their mix of dottiness and sentiment appealing both to young children and to the parents who read them aloud' (Louette Harding, The Daily Mail). Working together, they saw their books as more than simply the combin