The Underneath

by Kathi Appelt

Hardcover, 2008

Status

Available

Local notes

Fic App

Barcode

11

Collection

Publication

Atheneum Books for Young Readers (2008), Edition: First Edition, Hardcover, 320 pages

Description

An old hound that has been chained up at his hateful owner's run-down shack, and two kittens born underneath the house, endure separation, danger, and many other tribulations in their quest to be reunited and free.

Awards

National Book Award (Finalist — Young People's Literature — 2008)
Triple Crown Awards (Nominee — 2011)
Buckeye Children's & Teen Book Award (Nominee — Grades 6-8 — 2010)
William Allen White Children's Book Award (Nominee — Grades 6-8 — 2010-2011)
Newbery Medal (Honor Book — 2009)
PEN Center USA Literary Award (Winner — Children's Literature — 2009)
Virginia Readers' Choice (Nominee — Middle School — 2011)
Delete Key Award (Finalist — 2009)

Original publication date

2008

Physical description

320 p.; 8.1 inches

User reviews

LibraryThing member tapestry100
The Underneath is a powerfully written story about family, whether it is your family that you are born to or the the family that you choose for yourself. It is a story about promises. It is a story about anger and revenge. It is a story about redemption. It is a story filled with too many chapter
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breaks.

Did that last sentence feel a little out of place? That's how I felt about the frequent chapter breaks in the book. The book is 311 pages, with 124 chapters. Some chapters are as little as one paragraph. It seemed very unnecessary in many cases, and became very distracting, breaking up the story too many times.

However, the story itself is still very powerful and touching. You know you're reading a good book when the villain does something extraordinarily evil and you just want to hit him yourself. Several times over. The message about keeping your family close, whoever that family ends up being, and about keeping your promises, is told very well, the two messages intermingling throughout the story.

Highly recommended.
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LibraryThing member katec9999
I feel that I should like this book – the reviews have been great, and it won a Newbery honor and a National Book Award. But I quite frankly did not like this book. First of all, the cover is very deceiving. Looking at the illustration of the sad-eyed hound dog and his two kitten companions,
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you’d think it would be the cute story of an unlikely animal family. While that is part of the story, the rest of the story is dark and depressing. The pregnant calico cat has been abandoned, driven out to the woods and left there by her owners. She finds the dog, Ranger, chained to the porch of a run down house. Ranger’s owner physically and emotionally abuses him, as he himself was abused as a child. There’s also a subplot about a thousand year old snake trapped in a jar that I’m just not even going to get into. The book jacket states that this is a “tale about the power of love.” More like a tale about child and animal abuse, abandonment, alcoholism, deceit and death. Most of the reviews praise the authors writing style, but I found it repetitive and boring. I felt impatient while I was reading it, like I was just waiting for it to be over. Perhaps children who like sad animal stories will like this tale, although it’s certainly not one that I would recommend. I think that the main audience for this book is adults who are interested in children’s literature. In fact, I did not find one review that was written by a child or young adult, which I think is telling.
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LibraryThing member bell7
Several stories strand together in this poetic tale. An abandoned, pregnant cat takes refuge with a lonely hound. A drunk called Gar Face - the owner of the hound - goes hunting daily and becomes obsessed with a huge alligator. A snake trapped in a jar under an old pine tree bides her time waiting
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for... what?

I started listening to this on audio, and while I liked the reader, I soon realized that the tone of the story was too contemplative for me to listen well and pay attention. Yet the story is meant to be read aloud. The sound of the words and phrases and sentences (and sentence fragments) beg for listening. It's the sort of book that a child might have to be begged to read, but a good reader could have them sitting spell-bound as the various story lines are revealed and eventually come together in a taut climax.
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LibraryThing member Whisper1
Destined to be one of my top ten favorite books in 2010, this amazing, stunningly complex 2009 Newbery Honor book and National Book Award finalist simply took my breath away!

A big thanks to Stasia (alcottacre) for recommending this one!

Journey to the dark recesses of the swampy Louisiana/Texas
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bayou where you find an alligator who is almost as large as the water that holds him, where you hear the hissing of the cottonmouth vipers and the sucking sound of the quick sand as it pulls and twists people and critters to their death, and where, along the deep forest path you see a lonely, mud caked, starving dog chained for years by a evil man who learned at an early age that to love equates to pain and thus it is better to hurt and maim all who cross your path.

Enter an abadoned, pregnant calico cat who stumbles upon the dog, and let your heart be warmed as together they provide solace to each other and to twin kittens. Watch as these four lonely animals in crisis bond together in the Underneath space of the raggedy house where tension lurks as each day is a challenge.

Mix the cast of bayou creatures, the dog and cats and one very nasty man and you will discover a tale of amazing magic and mythological proportion.

Five stars!
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LibraryThing member avatiakh
This will be going down as one of my top reads for the year. Good literature rises above its genre and this is a very fine book that does just that.
Appelt evokes the most enchanting, soulful setting in the Chaddo area of the bayous on the border of Louisana and Texas. Here an abandoned calico cat
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finds friendship with an old hunting hound underneath a ramshackle shack and gives birth to two fine kittens. They are safe in the Underneath because in the house lives the meanest man that ever walked, who dreams of catching the king of all alligators.
Appelt weaves in a magical, mythical story based on native folklore, and uses the trees to whisper and watch over the inhabitants of the forest as the story works towards the inevitable end. Her use of language is magic in itself.
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LibraryThing member BNBHarper
Summary: An abandoned calico cat hears a dog howling in the distance. The cat goes to search for the dog and finds the dog, Ranger. Ranger convinces the cat stay in the underneath so, the Dog owner, Gar-Face will not feed the kitty to the alligators. The abandoned Cat ends up having the kittens but
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the tough part is keeping the kittens in the underneath. Response: I love animal books as you probably can tell by the list of books I chose for this assignment. I am a big fan of the book, "Shiloh", which is still my favorite but this was a good book also. Theme/Connections: Animals; Love; Friendship
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LibraryThing member KarenBall
Newbery Honor Medal 2009Great animal story, set in the east Texas swamps! Ranger is a hound dog, owned by the cruel Gar Face. Gar Face accidentally shot Ranger in the leg while hunting a bobcat one night, and he blames the dog for getting in the way. Ranger has been chained to the back porch of the
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rundown shack where they live ever since. An abandoned calico cat finds her way to the shack after having been dumped on a back road at night, and Ranger befriends her and keeps her safe under the porch (the Underneath), away from Gar Face, who would use her as alligator bait if he discovered her. The cat gives birth to two tiny kittens, named Puck and Sabine, and Ranger finally has a little family of his own. Kittens are curious, and disaster strikes, separating the family, but supernatural forces are also at play here through ancient Caddo Indian legends of trees, snakes, birds, and a monstrously big creature known as the Alligator King. Beautifully written, this is for everyone.
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LibraryThing member poetontheone
My neighbor wanted me to me borrow this and read it, but I was hesitant. I didn't want to read a book about cats. I don't like cats too much. This isn't about cats though. It's about a mother cat, two kittens, and an old hound on a chain who sings the blues. It's also about a Lamia snake and her
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daughter, who leaves her snake skin for a lover, and leaves her mother. It is about wanting to belong, and trying to find your way. It's a simple book, but it's not. The prose, at its best, possesses a dark and almost Southern Gothic atmosphere. The gnarled face Gar in his corroded cabin clutching his rifle and sucking down black rum, keeping his poor old dog on a chain, and terrorizing the dog and his new found cat family, is the antagonist of the novel.

So many reviews of this book, by parents, complain of this book being too dark and confusing. One review I read even complained of the fact that there were allusions to magic in the book, and that their family "did not involve themselves in magic". So much negative reception of this novel, if not from legitimate criticism of how its narrative does sometimes drag and suffer redundancy, are from close minded and poorly educated parents looking for "wholesome books" who have no concept of the rich depths of literary and folkloric traditions, from which this book clearly borrows, and succeeds by doing so.
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LibraryThing member lhecker
A calico cat meets a chained hound on the bayous. She gives birth to two kittens and admonishes them to always stay beneath the porch for their safety. Unfortunately, the horrid owner of the dog, Gar-Face, has other menacing ideas. At the same time a snake is silently waiting to get revenge for the
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loss of her daughter. The finale has the creatures and the snake assisting each other.
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LibraryThing member jopearson56
This became immediately one of my all-time most favorite books in the world. I loved the writing style, Ioved the story. The copy I read was a library book, and I loved it so much I had to go buy my own copy. I recommend it to all my friends. I buy it for gifts. I cannot imagine it in the
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children's section of the library -- for how could children ever understand this sort of writing? And bravo to those who do, and who enjoy it. A wonderful story of the friendship of animals in the Texas bayou, animals made sentient but not so much anthropomorphized, lyrical, mystical, sweet, tense, compelling. I hope to read it over and over. Perhaps one day I'll be able to share it with my granddaughter.
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LibraryThing member abbylibrarian
Achingly sad, but ultimately hopeful, The Underneath is one of the best books I've read in a long time. A cat is abandoned in the bayou, searching and searching for a safe place to have her kittens. She hears the baying of a bloodhound and follows the sound to Ranger, an abused dog chained up by a
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man named Gar Face. Ranger tells her that she'll be safe as long as she stays under the house in The Underneath. Brilliantly written, not afraid of sadness or the violence that sometimes happens in the world, I highly recommend this for mature middle-grade readers.
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LibraryThing member hewayzha
Initially, I was a little confused because the story kept switching between a mythical past and current time. I loved the little calico kitty, her babies (Sabine and Puck) and Ranger. It was a magical story. The fantastic creatures from man's myths intertwined with a real world was thoroughly
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engaging. It had some purely happy moments and such bittersweetness other times. I am so glad I decided to read it, it is much too wonderous not to read.
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LibraryThing member smclawler
This is probably my favorite book from 2008, and its nomination for the National Book Award is well deserved. Set in the piney woods of Texas along the Louisiana border, it is hard to decide whether the story is a legend or myth. At any rate, the themes of unconditional love and unbridled hate are
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well constructed.
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LibraryThing member laurie_library
Ohhhh I cried! I love it when an author gets you so tangled up in the story that it feels real!
LibraryThing member edspicer
While the cover may lead some readers to assume that this book is for younger elementary students, it does not take long to discover that this unique book is, perhaps, better suited for older students. Ranger, the hound, is chained to the porch of Gar-Face, his hate-filled owner who barely
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remembers to feed him. When the calico cat wanders into Ranger’s territory looking for food for herself and the kittens she will soon deliver, Ranger must convince her to stay underneath the porch because Gar-Face will surely kill her on sight. When the two kittens are born, they are taught to stay in the Underneath. Kittens, however, are born to move and chase. One unfortunate day, a kitten moves from the protection of the Underneath and is caught by Gar-Face. Gar-Face plans to use this kitten and then the mother (who foolishly attempts a rescue) as bait to catch the alligator king. The plot details of this book are only half the story in this beautifully lyrical book. The voice is fresh; even the trees sing! I was not surprised to see this one win a National Book Award nomination because it has been my pick to win the Newbery from the moment I finished reading it. Please do not let the cover of this book trick you into thinking this is only for elementary students! I highly recommend this one for middle school libraries AND high school libraries (although it will take some initial selling before word of mouth takes over)!
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LibraryThing member DLVLibrary
This author is able to create beautiful poetic imagery and evoke deep emotions through language. And her prose is flowing and easy to read. But the two strands of the story just didn't connect with each other, though at the end there is somewhat of a reconciling of the two. The story of Grandmother
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Moccasin, an ancient serpent trapped in an earthen jar for over a thousand years, her "friend" Alligator King, the trees that serve as witnesses to centuries of human and animal suffering, and the shape-changing hawks and serpents just didn't juxtapose well with the survival story of the two kittens and their hound dog caretaker. Still, much of the story held my interest and I was impressed by the expert use of language.
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LibraryThing member Katethegreyt
Previous reviews have given information that I will not repeat, but this is a wonderful story of faith, hope, and redemption told through a cast of characters from two different times whose lives and experiences are interwoven. I had previously read a book on writing poetry by Appelt; her website
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brought my attention to this novel. It is marvelous!
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LibraryThing member jrbeach
My rating is for the audio version. I found it incredibly repetitious, boring and brutal. I listened to one one hour part out of five, and that was a struggle.
LibraryThing member nzlibrarygirl
Just magical. Wonderful writing, Leisurely pace builds up to an exciting and satisfying conclusion, lots of threads dealing with different characters' stories which all come together in the end. Effective, effecting characters,
LibraryThing member brie13028
Great book, the stories leave off suspensfull and wondering whats going to happen next.
LibraryThing member mestahler
The Underneath is an unusual book that tells the story of animals who love, a man and a snake who hate, an alligator who has dislikes deceit and trees that know everything. It is eloquent, beautifully descriptive and filled with loss and longing. I was swept away with the soaring birds and cried
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over the losses and the relentless missing. A wonderful book.
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LibraryThing member JaniceMB
This is a beautifully written, lyrical book. The imagery is beautiful even though the subject matter can be harsh. It is about the love between an abused dog and an abandoned cat and her kittens. It shows the world as a harsh place with some spots of beauty. This book is slow paced, it is not
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action-packed and may not appeal to the "impatient" reader.

I think it would have won the Newbery award in a different year, competition was great in 2008.
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LibraryThing member francescadefreitas
This could have been really, really twee, but it was the opposite, it was poetry. Full of beauty and ugliness, and love where you least expect to find it. It starts in many different places, with a cat abandoned on a road, a boy beaten and scarred by his father, a snake who wanted a daughter more
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than anything.
The illustrations are wonderful, the one of Puck trying to cross the water have made me love the character more than I thought possible.
I think that this would be lovely to read out loud - I do wonder if it will appeal more to adults than to the kids?
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LibraryThing member thebooky
I picked up the book because I liked the cover and was pleased that I'd picked up a Newbery winner. I can tell you that the people who select Newbery awards probably do not confer with children. It took me months to get through this book with my son who is 10. During this time we read other books
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to completion. We kept going back to this book because I felt that there had to be something we were missing and it was going to get better if we just kept reading. It didn't happen. I didn't care for the way the author interwove the two stories. My son didn't care for the story and though it is geared toward children I can't imagine too many of them actually enjoying it.
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LibraryThing member VioletBramble
This story is actually four interconnected stories that span thousands of years. One story thread is about Gar Face, an abused, disfigured man who spends his nights hunting for the Alligator King and lives in a crooked house in the bayou where he keeps his no longer trusty hound dog chained up. A
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second story segment is about the hound dog, Ranger, and the pregnant calico cat who befriends him. Together they raise her kittens, Sabine and Puck. The four become a family. The third part of the story is about Grandmother Moccasin, trapped in a jar buried in the roots of a tree and her memories of her daughter Night Song, who married Hawk Man and had a daughter of their own. The fourth part of the story is told by the trees who have witnessed countless stories for thousands of years.
The prose is beautiful, poetic. The story unfolds slowly, told in many short chapters. While often violent and sad the story is ultimately about the power of love. I thought many parts of the story were too violent for the intended age group. Highly recommended.
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Pages

320

Rating

½ (351 ratings; 3.9)
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