Best known for her Caldecott winning titles:  MITTENS, APRIL'S KITTENS, and MARSHMALLOW, Clare T. Newberry wrote and illustrated eighteen books in her career as an internationally published author and illustrator.

Below is a complete list of the Newberry books with stories and excerpts from my upcoming biography of my mother, In Search of the Cat Lady.(C)2003, Felicia N. Trujillo. Please do not use or reprint without permission of the author.

As a Paris art student, Clare wrote and illustrated her first book, HERBERT THE LION, and sent it to friend John Steinbeck's agent in New York.  In 1931, HERBERT pounced into the lives of American children.

"This is one of the most delightful and amusing picture books that has ever been published." Alice Dalgleish of Parents Magazine.

"This charming and clever picture book has a humor and fancy that appeal both to children and adults."
The New York Times

When HERBERT was re-issued in 1939, The New York Times praised:

"Elaborately becurled and long of limb, Herbert suggests the lions of Assyrian art. Children are delighted with the drawings which amusingly suggest the rapidity of Herbert's growth and motion, and effectively indicate the situation created by his impetuous disposition…"

HERBERT stayed in print until it was last re-issued in 1998 and the publishers, Smithmark, filed a Chapter 11 releasing brand new books to be sold as "used" and sometimes at collector's prices.

The next Newberry best seller was MITTENS, reviewed as one of the top fifty children's books published in 1937, "MITTENS has some of the very best cat pictures that have ever been made." The New York Times

MITTENS remained in print until re-issue in 1998 also by Smithmark.

BABETTE quickly followed, with Japanese brush drawings of a Siamese kitten in sepia wash. 
The handset type by Golden Hind Press was printed in the same sepia ink, an innovation highly praised by The Horn Book:
"You can almost feel the wonderful richness of the kitten's fur as you run your hand across the page."

The New York Times wrote three paragraphs, ending with:
"The pictures, as soft-textured as kitten's fur, show Babette and her regal mother in poses essentially feline and very appealing… "

In 1938, BARKIS, co-starring Ms. Newberry's ten year-old son, Stephen, garnered wonderful reviews:

"BARKIS, a cocker spaniel puppy with melting brown eyes, long silky ears, and absurdly babyish demeanor takes his place immediately as one of the most desirable pets to be found in a child's picture book."

COUSIN TOBY, my personal favorite, followed.  The New York Herald Tribune attested:

"Lovely as MITTENS or BABETTE...a day in the lives of a boy of five and a girl of six babysitting a toddler cousin, Toby...The expression of their wide-eyed faces...brings an unaccountable lump into the throat of anyone whose children have grown up…"

APRIL'S KITTENS won the coveted Caldecott Award and the reviewers went wild:

"Mrs. Newberry is the paragon of cat portraitists, " declared The New Yorker.

"The pictures in her distinctive sooty blacks and smoky grays are, if possible, even better and more beguiling…" The New York Times

"An irresistible tale...the illustrations are extraordinary, both as stunning cat pictures and beautiful decorations...our favorite for 1940." Cue Magazine

Her next book. DRAWING A CAT, was featured in articles all over the country and resulted in a one-woman show on New York's Park Avenue.  From the forward by Thomas Craven:

"Her insight into the cat's life, and her knowledge of structure, her skills as a draughtsman and her extraordinary lightness of touch have enabled her to delineate animals with a personal distinction usually reserved for human beings."