Pawprints in Time

The mysterious myth of a cat's nine lives lurks at the heart of this well-crafted picture book by first-timers Butler and Smith. A feline shadow lingers on the elegant endpapers, hinting at the creature's elusive nature. When Anna lets a stray in her window one night, he announces, ""I am a cat with stories to tell""; he then proceeds to introduce his nine lives in successive spreads. From ancient Egypt, where cats ""lie buried beneath the pyramids with the Pharaohs... curled up to sleep for thousands of years"" to China's long silk road to wagon trains headed West, the feline touches on events he has witnessed over the centuries. Butler tickles readers with a few choice observations but purposefully evades the details, heightening the cryptic aura of her lead character. The cadence of the economical, smooth prose makes it ideal for reading aloud, and its broad historical strokes may well inspire readers to seek out the finer points of each era. Smith's sumptuous artwork, meanwhile, bewitches with delicate brushwork that holds each whisker daintily in place; the artist plants tantalizing artifacts from each period (an ornate mummy and hieroglyphics in Egypt, a map of the silk route in China), fleshing out the measured prose. Together, author and artist capture the enigmatic essence of that eminently self-contained creature, the cat, in a quietly arresting debut. Ages 3-8. (May)