CHI IS SO KAWAII! Nothing really happens in this comic, but it's so fun to read. Chi gets lost, finds a family, learns how to use the litter box, plays and generally gets into trouble like most kittens do. It's fun for anyone, really, but you have to specifically be in the mood for something cute and childish. The translation from Japanese is sort of awkward, since Chi is basically named by a potty training child saying "pee", or the Japanese "chi". It doesn't really make sense saying chi in English, but I guess you can chalk it up to baby talk. It reminded me a lot of the Swedish manga Mjau! which is also full of every day stories about bathing and litter training kittens. Maybe Chi was an inspiration? We wanted to love these books. The stories are so sweet and right up Logan's cat-loving alley. And they are indeed great, if I read them aloud. But as beginning reader, Logan found this pretty frustrating. To begin with, most of the text is sound effects. For example, meow, miaow, miu, meowr, mee ow, miuu, mrreow, fwshh, fwish, fwoosh, vrrrr, wobbl, fwump, gya, kyaa, growor, yoink, sproing, thud, bwaaaah, waaah, gwaa, argh, wuff (and that's all just in the first 25 pages). It was confusing to have so many spellings of meow and sounding out all of these words was excruciating after a while. On top of that, many of those words and some of the text is written vertically, making it harder for him. So then we tried me reading the sound effects and him reading the dialog, but we came upon the next frustration: Chi, the kitten, alternates between regular talk and baby talk. For example, "that was scarewy," "fwightening," "gwassy pwace," "miulk," "shtay," "shleeping," "whazzat," "they're kiwling me," "hard twime," "gwad," "pwease," and "pway." Again, that's in the first 25 pages. So I will probably end up reading the whole thing aloud, which is fine. But if people are recommending this to you as a way to get new readers to read, think again. It wasn't a good fit for us.
What do You think about チーズスイートホーム 1 (モーニングKCDX (2004)?
update: +1 *My nephew is living with me for a couple of weeks. I recommended this book to him. I was so well pleased that he was willing to try it; I'd tried to recommend this series before and never had anyone taken me up on it. He loves it. He read it at least 6 times and asked for the next volumes.He told me "I think I'm a lot like Chi" and I can see that. :) Chi misses her mom. She is well taken care of by her human family, but some of their customs are strange! From what he has said to me, plus what I've interpreted on my own, this book comforted him and engaged him. Both individually and for the whole family|household, I'd say it's a spectacular win. (My niece and husband read it too — and all four of us liked it! What besides a cute kitten could unite disparate tastes?) For all this I amend it from *** to ****.
—bedelia515
It is so cute, that any cat lover would love to read and laugh out aloud.(≧ω≦) I laughed so much while reading and it helped with raising my spirits while having a horrible and crappy day. While battling depression. So I plan on reading the rest of the series. I read this in one seating or mor like laying down. It keeps you entertain and laughing. Chi and Yohey become characters that you will fall in love with quick. Well for me they did. Definitely a great read!:)
—Braydon
Très drôle, touchant, j'adore ce chaton !
—Manfree31
