Rika Saves a Cat

By: Lamar Golden, Liana Golden

Narrated by: Wendy Tremont King

A story of two sisters from Planet Venesha playing hide and seek in the woods when they hear a strange sound and go to investigate. They look and find a cat who appears to be all alone, and wait for its mother to return.

Wendy Music: "West in Africa" by John Bartmann

"Carefree" by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License

creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Music promoted on chosic.com/free-music/all/

©2023 Lamar Golden and Liana Golden (P)2024 Lamar Golden and Liana Golden

Too Much Goin On

I love that a father-and-daughter team collaborated on this book. While I absolutely adore audiobooks, I don't believe that picture books translate well into that format; only one I’ve reviewed out of several has been worthwhile strictly as an audiobook. So much depends upon the pictures for a picture book! Unfortunately, I don't feel like this 5-minute audiobook is worth it. The narrator attempts to give it value, but she overcompensates. The book has music and sound effects that overwhelm the very short story and her voice. As lively as the music and sounds are, this would not be good to listen to at bedtime. The story itself is the rather standard one of a child rescuing a lost kitten. The distinction from most is that it takes place on another planet. I have not seen the picture book itself, as the author was not offering it at the same time at the book review site I got the audiobook from, nor did he include it as a part of the audiobook at Audible. It would undoubtedly be better as just a picture book.

Cute story about helping others

This story begins the same way as many of the other stories by this father-daughter duo: with a 2-sentence description of the planet in which the story takes place. I actually like this repetitive intro for books set in this imagined world of theirs. It helps the young person in my life to connect to the setting better in preparation for each new story.

The story is sweet and simple and conveys exactly the lessons I try to teach. I appreciate the sound effects and music. Although I thought the music was a bit loud compared to the narrator's volume, I could hear the entire story, and it didn't detract from my preschool-aged co-listener's experience. In fact, they asked me to replay the story five times.

I received a free copy of this book and am voluntarily leaving a review.