2 stories
Cat stories
Clever cats, cosy cats, and one in a rather good pair of boots
There are two cat stories in this collection, both about five minutes and both listed for ages three to seven: The Cat and the Mice, and The Cat Who Could Eat So Much.
Cats in fairy tales are schemers, and children adore them for it. Here are the tricksters, the loyal companions and the kittens who simply want to be found and taken home. The cat in boots is the star, but the quieter stories here, of cats who keep a lonely old woman company or guard a mill from mice, make gentler bedtime reading for the youngest listeners.
Where to start with cat stories
6 min
Ages 3–7 · Rhyming Stories & Poems
The Cat Who Could Eat So Much
Whiskers, a friendly cat, has an insatiable appetite that worries his village. Advised by a wise owl, he embarks on a…
6 min
Ages 3–7 · Classic Tales
The Cat and the Mice
In a peaceful village, happy mice live simple, joyous lives. But when a sleek, cunning cat arrives, he dreams only of…
Both cats, described properly
The Cat and the Mice is five minutes and gentle in mood. A cat and a household of mice work out how to live alongside each other, and the point it makes — that making friends beats getting your own way — is unusually kind for a story with a predator in it. It is the better of the two for the very end of the evening.
The greedy one
The Cat Who Could Eat So Much is also five minutes, listed three to seven, and marked adventurous rather than gentle. It is a cumulative tale: the cat eats, and eats, and eats, and the list gets longer each time. Children love the repetition and will start reciting it before you get to the end, which makes it a good one to read twice.
The other cats on the site
Two is not much of a week. There are cats elsewhere that simply do not sit in this collection. Puss in Boots, retold from Charles Perrault, is six minutes and is the great cat story: a con artist in footwear who talks his master into a fortune. The Cat and the Old Rat is the other one worth knowing, a fable about a cat who is outmatched by an older, warier rat.
If your child's real interest is small clever animals, mice stories is the bigger shelf and comes at the same standoff from the other side.
Reading a repeating story aloud
The Cat Who Could Eat So Much is built on a list, and lists are read badly when they are read at one speed. Slow down slightly with each addition and give the last item a pause. That is the whole technique, and it works for every cumulative tale on this site.
Our guide to reading a bedtime story aloud covers the rest of it. Cats also suit a quiet, unimpressed voice: almost nothing a cat says in a story needs volume, and the contrast with the mice is most of the comedy.
For more short animal tales while you wait for the cat shelf to grow, dog stories has seven and animal stories has the full 210, many of them four or five minutes long.
Collections that share these stories
Ranked by how many stories they have in common with this one.
Questions about cat stories
How many cat stories are in this collection?
Two: The Cat and the Mice and The Cat Who Could Eat So Much. Both run about five minutes and both are listed for ages three to seven.
Is Puss in Boots a cat story?
It is, though it sits under other collections on this site. It is a six-minute retelling of the Charles Perrault tale, listed for ages four to eight.
Which cat story is calmer for bedtime?
The Cat and the Mice. It is marked gentle in mood and ends with the cat and the mice on good terms.