The Cat Who Ate Danish Modern Cat Who... :: Education by Design Store

Customer Reviews

This is an Incredibly Charming Book

2008-07-02
THE CAT WHO ATE DANISH MODERN is the second novel in the "Cat Who..." series by Lilian Jackson Braun. This book, which was originally written in 1968, features a middle-aged, bachelor reporter named James Qwillerian and his cat Koko, who work together to solve crimes.

If you're looking for a well-plotted murder mystery, you will no doubt be disappointed by this book. In many ways, the murder plot is almost an afterhtought (it's not very hard to guess who the killer is). The major reason to read THE CAT WHO ATE DANISH MODERN is to enjoy the sheer charm of Braun's writing style. Braun writes her prose in a light, gentle, and humorous manner that is difficult to resist. Qwillerian is a lovable character, and it's fun to watch him react to the people and events around him.

THE CAT WHO ATE DANISH MODERN is as light as a feather, but it's an enjoyable way to spend a few hours. If you like your mysteries cozy and traditional, without sex or violence or mean-spiritedness, this series is definitely worth a try. The first book in this series, THE CAT WHO COULD READ BACKWARDS, is equally enjoyable in my opinion.

My understanding is that the more recent books in the CAT WHO series are pretty awful, so you may want to avoid those and limit yourself to the earlier entires.

Qwill meets Yum Yum

2007-12-19
Jim Qwilleran is a reporter for the Daily Fluxion. He's been working the art beat for the paper despite knowing nothing about art. His editor reassigns him to work on a magazine about interior design, of which he is equally ignorant. After he and his photographer do their first main feature on a private residence, the house is robbed. This starts Jim down a road that gets more and more complex and leaves him grasping for an explanation as to why every place they feature in the magazine has some sort of calamity immediately afterward. Thankfully, his Siamese cat, Koko, is there to give him the solution.

This is the second book in the "Cat Who..." series and it continues most of the pattern from the first. Jim gets a new home, takes on an unfamiliar assignment at the paper, a murder occurs related to his story, and he investigates with Koko's help. The supporting cast is pretty strong with some interesting personalities. Jim gets a girlfriend who is especially appealing, but she doesn't become a permanent cast member. The whol book is less than 250 pages, so you might well imagine that pacing is not much of a problem. Things move along smartly and is wrapped up satisfactorily at the end. This book also introduces Yum Yum, the female Siamese that becomes Koko's crime-solving companion.

Many people fall in love with the "Cat Who..." books and devour dozens of them. The writing is light and easy to digest. After reading the first two books in this series, I haven't gotten hooked but they were enjoyable reads. Fans of the series, would certainly do well to read this book, since it introduces Yum Yum. New readers don't need to read either this novel, or The Cat Who Could Read Backwards (Cat Who...) in order to enjoy the later entries in the series, but they're a good place to start just the same.

Fun for all

2007-02-06
What more can be said about this book that hasn't been said below. I will say that the shinanigans are in full swing this time with KoKo and Qwill and things are sure to get even crazier with the edition of Yum Yum.

In this second installment in The Cat Who... series we find Qwill on a new beat journaling the many different and eccentric people of the designing world. With each additional Gracious Abodes hot off the press comes a hot crime. Does someone have it in for Qwill and the Daily Fluxion or is it merily coincidence. Find out and more in this latest backstabing and fun addition of the Cat Who....series. With this one in the bag you will surely want to get your claws on the next in the series The Cat Who Turned On and Off and find out what Qwill, KoKo and the newest addition Yum Yum are up to.....

The Cat Who Ate Danish Modern audio version is a pleasure to listen to!

2006-09-06
This is an enjoyable audio fit for the whole family. Crime is committed but the story is told without using graphic language or imagery. George Guidall's "reading" ability brings the characters to life.

My Favorite Series!

2006-07-06
In the 2nd book in The Cat Who...series, we meet again James Qwilleran aka "Qwill", a newsman for the Daily Fluxion. Returning to writing for a paper after several years absence trying to get his life together in which excessive alcohol was a factor, Jim has sobered up and sought gainful employment. After having been assigned to the art beat on his previous assignment for the Fluxion, Qwill is happy to be given a new assignment...until he discovers what it is. He is given the daunting task of writing a weekly magazine style insert titled "Gracious Abodes" that will focus on the world of interior design. Knowing nothing of the topic, Qwill throws himself into his new post, and quickly discovers that he has a lot to learn. When a home is robbed that was featured in the first edition of Gracious Abodes, Qwill wonders if his new assignment will be a curse. Several more mishaps occur with each edition, and Qwill begins to believe that someone is out to make the Fluxion and himself look bad. With the help of KoKo and the addition of his new cat, Yum Yum, a long-standing friendship and crime-solving trio is formed.

This is my favorite cozy mystery series! I had read all of the books in the past, and wanted to read them again for a second time. This time around, I have chosen to listen to them on CD, as I love the voice of George Guidall. Some of Qwill's background is explained, and it was interesting to revisit how Qwill found Yum Yum and where her unusual name originated. For those that have not read the series, I do recommend reading the first several first. Many others can be intermixed, but this book offers good insight to the way that Qwill and KoKo relate to one another in future installments. This is a great series by my favorite author!

The first book in the series is called "The Cat who Could Read Backwards". Enjoy!

And Introducing Yum Yum

2005-03-26
Jim Qwilleran is not exactly thrilled by his new assignment for the Daily Fluxion--a weekly magazine on interior design. But Qwilleran finds himself on familiar territory when a murder is committed, and he and Koko, the brilliant Siamese, take the case. Reissue.

In which Qwilleran. . .

2004-02-10
. . .is taken off the Art beat, and assigned to the task of edition a color supplement for the "Daily Fluxion". The subject? Decorating!

In this tightly written mystery, Qwilleran, with the help of Koko the brilliant Siamese cat, solves the mystery of two murders and the apparent theft of hundreds of thousands of dollars in collectible jade. By the end, he also acquires a second cat, the delightful female Siamese Yum Yum.

One of the better of the series and a good rainy day read.

When Qwill and Koko met Yum-Yum 2004-01-03
As the second book of this popular series opens Qwill is trying to work up the nerve to ask for a different writing assignment. The former crime reporter has spent the past six months, since The Cat Who Could Read Backwards, covering the art scene and is anxious to get back to something more in keeping with his background. His assignment is changed but to writing features for the new weekly supplement on interior design. Since he cannot afford to quit he gamely decides to tackle the project.

Within a short period of time he is immersed into a new world filled with characters every bit as strange and colorful as the arts crowd he has just left. Life seems to be looking up for Qwill, the writing assignment is going well and one of his new friends asks Qwill and Koko to housesit his apartment while he is away on business. After the new magazine hits the stands problems begin, thefts and bodies begin to pile up. Pointed in the right direction by Koko's hints Qwill solves the mysteries. Along the way both Koko and Qwill acquire new ladies in their lives, Koko has found his Yum-Yum and Qwill begins a romance with 'Cokey' Wright, a designer who shares is taste for modern decor.

This mystery was originally published in 1967 but has worn well. The fans of this series need to be aware that this is not set in Moose County but instead covers Qwill earlier life in the Big City 'down below'. The characters that Qwill meets are, however, every bit as charming and quirky as those in Moose County, and like those in the later books do seem to turn up in subsequent novels. Unlike the later additions to this series the emphasis is more on murder and less on cozy although there is no profanitiy, graphic violence or explicit sex.

Great bed-time mystery... 2003-09-27
This is a pleasant, well-written book that is interesting enough to keep you reading without being such a pageturner that you're up all night finishing it. It reads quickly because of the writing style and the characters are engaging and interesting -- particularly the cats, KoKo and YumYum. Given how long ago this book was written (it's the second in a long series), it has held up very well.

The "detective" is newspaper journalist Qwilleran, who has been given the unwelcome task of editing a weekly "magazine" section centered around interior design and showcase homes. Through this, he enters the world of interior designers and some of their wealthy customers. The day after the first issue of the magazine hits the stands, the homeowner whose home was featured is burglarized, losing a very valuable jade collection and a wife. Each attempt to photograph a designer home seems to be equally jinxed, and Qwilleran decides he must solve the first burglary to save the magazine (he has decided he likes his new assignment). With the help of his astonishingly intelligent Siamese cat Ko-Ko, he eventually solves all of the crimes that have taken place in the homes he has showcased in his magazine.

The elapse of thirty plus years since this book was first published have made this book seem perhaps like a little time capsule of life in the late 60s, and there is a certain leisureliness and gentleness about the book. This is not a suspense thriller, and I didn't finding myself caring all that much who did it, but rather enjoyed spending time with Qwilleran, his cats, and his friends.

Crime reporter transferred to interior decorating beat 2003-05-27
When I first read this mystery, it was the second of a 3-volume series, the last of which had appeared in 1968. Only with the 4th book, THE CAT WHO SAW RED (1986), did the series take off into its at-least-1-book-a-year mode, and only with the 5th, TCW PLAYED BRAHMS, did Braun introduce Qwill to Moose County.

TCW ATE DANISH MODERN was the first Qwilleran book I ever read, and although it's best to begin with book 1, TCW COULD READ BACKWARDS, I can testify that you won't be lost if you pick this up first instead, nor will you spoil the solution of the previous book.

Qwill is the type who'd probably think of himself as a dog person if he weren't a city dweller, but after the death of his landlord, he acquired custody of his landlord's closest companion: Kao K'o Kung, a Siamese familiarly known as Koko. (The original hardcover dustjacket was graced with a photograph of his namesake: the author's feline companion.) The other consequences of his landlord's death led to one of Qwill's 4 problems at the opening of the story: 1) he has to find a new place to live, 2) he wants to be in the Daily Fluxion's city room rather than on the art beat, 3) no current girlfriend, and 4) moths are eating up all his ties - so he runs the risk of being homeless, jobless, womanless, and tieless all at once. (Hey, I didn't say this was Shakespearean tragedy.)

Before Qwill can request a transfer from the managing editor, he's informed that a change of assignment is already lined up: the FLUXION is trying to divert advertising revenue from magazines to their own coffers, and so a new Sunday supplement is coming online, and Qwill will be in charge of its features. The catch? The home furnishing industry is making the advertising experiment - so the Sunday magazine, GRACIOUS ABODES, covers the interior decorating beat. Qwill's horrified reaction is softened since the transfer includes a promotion and raise. Odd Bunsen, the Flux's daredevil photographer, is slower to overcome his resentment at his own transfer.

Up through book 4, this was the standard opening move in a Qwill story: transfer the poor devil from his current assignment to some weird beat as far from the City Room as a veteran crime reporter could imagine, and throw him in at the deep end. As with his previous assignment to the art beat, he finds the professional rivalries unexpectedly interesting.

Consider Lyke and Starkweather, for instance - Starkweather (a rather bland middle-aged executive) handles the business end while Lyke handles clients and the actual decoration jobs. Lyke's charismatic, but the depths beneath his surface charm are somewhat murky. He butters people up left and right, then sneers at them for taking him seriously. His childhood friendship - back before he moved uptown and changed his name - with Jack Baker ended acrimoniously after Jack saved his pennies, went to the Sorbonne, then returned to town as "Jacques Boulonger", the Duxburys' decorator "from Paris". (Jack's background isn't really secret, but his society clients wouldn't like to admit that far from being an exotic novelty, he's a self-made African-American from their own city.) Jack even rubbed in his success at having taken away Lyke's old money clients by moving into the Villa Verandah, where Lyke lives, but in a nicer apartment on a higher floor. :) Lyke does well enough, though, with the new money clients out in Lost Lake Hills.

By chance, Qwill starts with Lyke when seeking a big society name for the cover of GRACIOUS ABODES' first issue, and thus draws the Taits. At first Mrs. Tait's sharp tongue seems the worst feature of the household, and Tait's obsession with his jade collection the oddest. Then the morning after the first issue of Gracious Abodes hits the street, Tait's jade collection is stolen, his wife is dead of a heart attack, and the police - and the FLUXION's competitor, the MORNING RAMPAGE - are asking why the Flux seems to be printing blueprints for burglary. (One of the elements dating the story is the FLUXION's policy of always printing names and addresses, but as you can see, its logical consequences come home to roost.)

Each of the first few editions of GRACIOUS ABODES is plagued by a different catastrophe, and Qwill faces reassignment to the church editor's beat if he can't break the jinx. Are some or all of the incidents related - and if so, who's behind them?

I recommend the unabridged audio read by George Guidall over the book on its own, although I enjoy that too. Scenes like Odd Bunsen's drunken pursuit of Koko across the balconies of the Villa Verandah must be heard to be appreciated fully. :)