The Diary of a Killer Cat (The Killer Cat Series Book 1)

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The comical aspect of this book makes it an extremely useful tool in aiding the development of both children’s reading and writing skills: The story is written in the first person. Can you write a story from somebody else’s point of view? If you like this book, here are some other books you might enjoy - including the further adventures of Tuffy the Killer Cat.

The Diary of a Killer Cat by Anne Fine is a book for younger children. It was first published in 1994. Write a diary entry from the point of view of your own (or a friend’s) pet. How does it feel about living with the family? What does it like? What does it dislike? The book can be used to inspire creative writing. As it is from the perspective of a cat (in first person), children could use this technique to practice writing from different points of view. From the point of view of their own pet to the point of view of Ellie in the book there are a range of different perspectives that can be explored.This is a humorous book about a cat that kills yet cannot understand why his family are upset with this. He is a ‘cheeky’ kind of character always trying to justify his actions, which the children would like. The illustrations are funny which would be useful in class to keep children engaged. It also has as great sense of sarcasm about it, again useful when introducing the notion of sarcasm as it gives great examples. This book is brilliantly written and had me laughing throughout. Anne Fine manages to give Tuffy a brilliantly cheeky personality, which children and adults alike will fall in love with. It is the first story in a series of four, all of which are as good as this debut. Highly recommended for children, parents and teachers. Another writing task that could be initiated in using this book, could be one that involves writing in a different form. Called a diary, this book could be used to trigger an activity that involves writing in the form of a diary. Questions such as: How do you structure a diary? How would you structure yours? Using dates, times? Would you name your diary, and write to them?: are all questions can be posed in the lesson to help children think about the different forms a diary can take in itself. There are a number of books in the ‘Killer Cat’ series. Can you write a new story involving the character? Tuffy is grounded for his behaviour. Can you write a new story about a pet who is grounded for their bad behaviour?

The hilarious antics of Tuffy and his family are told by the killer cat himself. Teaching Ideas and Resources: English

Bill's New Frock

Because let's face the facts here, Tuffy is able to be such an unrelenting hunter and "killer cat" because Ellie and her family in The Diary of a Killer Cat are shown by Anne Fine as obviously having no qualms whatsoever regarding letting their pet freely and continuously roam outside and with there even being a designated cat door so that Tuffy can freely enter and exit at will. And well, for me personally (and as someone who is increasingly aware of the fact that domestic cats are an invasive species and can be a major threat to and for birds), permitting pet felines to be outside cats or even both outside and inside cats is (at least for me) totally unacceptable and also environmentally problematic behaviour and that at the very least, there should be in The Diary of a Killer Cat more attempts being made to keep Tuffy inside, with me also thinking that Anne Fine as an author and as a person probably seems to think that outside cats are acceptable (with which I beg to differ and that this kind of even makes me, makes my adult self see a bit proverbially red regarding The Diary of a Killer Cat, and that my five star rating for my inner child is lowered to only three stars when my adult reading self thinks about Tuffy being continuously outside in The Diary of a Killer Cat and this all being pretty much considered tolerably unproblematic by Anne Fine). Okay, okay. So hang me. I killed the bird. For pity's sake, I'm a cat. It's practically my job to go creeping round the garden after sweet little eensy-weensy birdy-pies that can hardly fly from one hedge to another. So what am I supposed to do when one of the poor feathery little flutterballs just about throws itself into my mouth? I mean, it practically landed on my paws. It could have hurt me."