The Golden Twine

Cat's Cradle Book 1: The Golden Twine
Jo Rioux
112 pages
Elementary+

The orphan Suri lives with a group of travelling caravans, hiding from the leader of the camp.  The rest of the group tolerate her, hide her from the leader, but wish that she would get a real job, not just pretend to be a monster tamer.  While she learned almost everything there is to know about monsters from a book, sometimes she can be a little blind to what is right in front of her eyes.

But when a mysterious caravan joins their troop, the monstrous thing hiding inside of it gets Suri's attention.  Not to mention rumors of caitsith, cat-like creatures that can only be distinguished by their tails.  Has Suri gotten in over her head?  Or will the medallion she made with a dragon's tooth and some pretty string she found really help her to overcome obstacles?

This was a really fun book!  I found myself smiling and giggling while reading it- not because of outright humor, but more because of little things.  Great story- lots of fun!

I really liked the characters.  Instead of being flat and static, they have depth and history.  You learn about about Suri's history, her dreams and quirks.  Even the other characters have fun quirks and habits.  They aren't just stock characters.  While this is just the beginning of a series, I can see lots of potential for future interactions between various groups of characters, such as the circus people versus the prince versus the caitsith.  Lots more stuff that can happen in future books!

The Golden Twine also had a really nice balance of artwork and story line.  The illustrations used color in a slightly different way: lots of children's graphic novels tend to be either monochromatic (just one color) or super bright and cartoon-like.  While this has more muted colors, there is still lots of color to be found in the book, and is used in very significant ways.  Great illustrations, they add a lot to the story, much like the Amulet books.

Overall, I really had fun with this book!  Lots of variety in characters, potential for some great story lines, and a great balance of art to story.  Definitely one I will recommend to kids!