Books: Cats and their Humans, Fictional and Real

 Fictional and Real Cats and Those Who Meet Them

I'm a dog lover myself, but I see so many books about cats and their importance to their humans that I had to list a few. Japanese authors in particular, seem to love and respect cats as not only good luck, but having a mystical presence.

Here's a recent novel by American writer, Anne Tyler

Three Days in June by Anne Tyler, Feb. 11, 2025; Knopf, NetGalley
Genre: family dynamics, contemporary adult fiction

It took the reappearance of Gail's ex-husband Max with his cat to soften her heart over the next three days in June, when Max showed up to attend their daughter Debbie's wedding to her fiance, Kenneth. Gail at first didn't want the cat in the house, but the cat took a liking to Gail and slept with her in her bed at night. Max also slowly eased his way back into his ex-wife's heart, even though the ending seemed ambiguous as to their future.

I liked that their daughter Debbie did not want to make the same mistake her parents did in their marriage. Forgive and forget seems to be Max's motto, echoed by Debbie. 

I was surprised by Gail's admission to daughter Debbie about the reason for her divorce from Max those many years ago. And Gail, as the story's narrator, admitting that soft hearted Max would never hurt anyone he loved.

An unusual look at a marriage that was, and a marriage to be. The book gave reason to think about family dynamics on another level.

The Curious Kitten at the Chibineko Kitchen by Yuta Takahashi
Published Feb. 4, 2025; Penguin, NetGalley

Genre: magical realism, death and loss

I enjoyed reading about twenty-year-old Kotoko Niki visiting the seaside town of Uchibo to have a "remembrance meal" for her brother at the Chibineko Kitchen. Kotoko feels responsible for the untimely death of her older brother who had risked his life saving her from a car accident on the street.

The Chibineko Kitchen meal comes with added incentive - the spirit of the deceased being remembered could be seen and heard for the brief moment the food stays warm on the table. Kotoko feels this meal is a way to apologize to her brother. There are a few other people who interact with their deceased loved ones at the remembrance meals.

Chibineko means "little kitten" in Japanese, and there is a little cat at the restaurant that is often present before and after the meals. When Kai, the son of the restaurant's owner, wants to close the kitchen after his ailing mother passes away, Kotoko seems to find purpose in helping Kai decide whether or not to keep the kitchen open and continue the remembrance meals.

A very cute story of death, loss, the afterlife, and remembrance. With a little magical cat in attendance.

The Blanket Cats by Kiyoshi Shigematsu, February 25, 2025; Putnam & Sons; NetGalley

Genre: contemporary Japanese fiction, cats, short stories

I'm eager to get into this book to see how seven customers of a pet shop are helped by taking home a "blanket cat" for just three days. The cats are mysterious and somehow magical, so that the problems of the caregivers will resolve themselves after just three days with the cats in their homes. 

Clever and unusual idea for a book of short stories with the "blanket cat" theme.

A memoir

Poets Square: A Memoir in Thirty Cats by Courtney Gustafson 

Publication: April 29, 2025; Crown; NetGalley 

I'm amazed by the description of a memoir by a woman who moves into an old house in Poets Square in Tucson, Arizona and befriends a large group of feral cats.The street cats become her family as they "reshaped her ... empathy, resilience, and the healing power of wholly showing up for something outside yourself."

The stories she tells about the personalities of the 30 cats, on TikTok and Instagram, also helped her save her home. I don't yet know if she takes them into her home, though, but only feeds them in alleyways and wherever they show up. I'll find out when I read the entire book and also see how the author may differ from cat ladies we read about in the news who live in dismal circumstances with an overload of cats in the home.

Advance Praise

'Cats are mystical beings, bridging the spiritual and the tangible. Courtney Gustafson’s Poet Square is a book that helps us connect to this spiritual world, offering a bridge to the ethereal.' Ai Weiwei

What are you reading or watching this week? 

Memes:  The Sunday Post, It's Monday: What Are You Reading, Sunday Salon, and Stacking the Shelves, Mailbox Monday 

Review of Weike Wang''s New Novel and Feature of a Memoir by Jon M. Chu, film director

Books by Weike Wang

 I read Wang's third novel, Rental House, reread Chemistry, and already read Joan Is Okay. I gave them all five stars, as I loved the way the books are written and the stories told in an often whimsical style .

 Rental House by Weike Wang

Published December 3, 2024; Riverhead Books

Keru and Nate seem to be opposites, yet they meet at an Ivy League college and land up getting married. Keru's well educated immigrant Chinese family is the opposite of Nate's rural American working class family, and the couple fit each other more than they fit into their own families.

The family dynamics play out in a shared family vacation at a rental house, with both sides spending time with each other, and then later visiting Keru and Nate at their home. The imbalance of their situation and their families leads Keru to take the lead in keeping everyone together. She felt she had to be always present to "right the course" and handle their families together.

"They would take better care of each other and their dog. The unit had to be protected and she would protect them. They were codependent, she and Nate. Without her, he lost grounding, but without him, she could be relentless and too focused."

An amazing solution to a situation full of contradictions and different life styles and expectations from the families of both sides.

Weike Wang is a graduate of Harvard University, where she earned her undergraduate degree in chemistry and her doctorate in public health. She received her MFA from Boston University. Her fiction has been published in or is forthcoming from Alaska Quarterly Review, Glimmer Train, The Journal, Ploughshares, Redivider, and SmokeLong Quarterly.

Currently reading 

Viewfinder: A Memoir of Seeing and Being Seen by Jon M. Chu, 

July 23, 2024; Random House

Description

Jon M. Chu, movie director of Crazy Rich Asians and Wicked, has written an inspiring memoir of belonging, creativity, and learning to see who you really are. Long before he directed Wicked, In The Heights, or Crazy Rich Asians, Jon M. Chu was a movie-obsessed first-generation Chinese American, helping at his parents’ Chinese restaurant in Silicon Valley and forever facing the cultural identity crisis endemic to children of immigrants. 

Growing up on the cutting edge of twenty-first-century technology gave Chu the tools he needed to make his mark at USC film school, and to be discovered by Steven Spielberg, but he soon found himself struggling to understand who he was. In this book, for the first time, Chu turns the lens on his own life and work, telling the universal story of questioning what it means when your dreams collide with your circumstances, and showing how it’s possible to succeed even when the world changes beyond all recognition.

What are you reading or watching this week?

Memes:  The Sunday Post, It's Monday: What Are You Reading, Sunday Salon, and Stacking the Shelves 

Sunday Salon: Three New Books Reviewed

 

Reviews

Kinda Korean: Stories from an American Life by Joan Sung

Genre: memoir

This novel is about a Korean-American girl's immigrant Tiger Mom, but it's about much more too that's just as, if not more, important. It's about growing up Asian in a society that "fetishizes" and "hypersexualizes" Asian woman. The writer discusses being assaulted so many times and "brainwashed" to believe that you should live in shame for who you are.

I found the memoir enlightening about the author's experiences and challenges faced by triple threats - having immigrant parents, being Asian, and being an Asian woman. To be made to feel that "being different" is always a bad thing. It was interesting that even a positive for Asians, being considered studious and hardworking, could be turned into a stereotype that implied that Asians could not experience racial discrimination.

The honest and forthright stories are compelling, amazing, and disturbing. It's a good thing that so many Asian women are finally speaking up, writing books, memoirs, histories that tell their stories and show their points of view and experiences.

I would encourage all readers to read this book, to understand in more depth the immigrant experience in the U.S., which may be similar to those in other countries as well.

Thanks to the publisher and to NetGalley for a copy of this book.

The Hunter's Daughter by Nicola Solvinic
Genre: magical realism, mystery, suspense

Anna Koray is a cop, but she grew up with a father skilled in outdoor living and the natural world - a hunter, who taught her about the forest and the creatures that live there. When Anna was still a teen, her father was executed for the murders of young women,. But now young women are being found again in the forests or woods, prepared in a way reminiscent of her father's methods. And Anna is on the case, no one knowing her real name as a child or who her father is.

The suspense was in finding out slowly about Anna's childhood relationship with her hunter father through frequent flashbacks in the narration. The element of magic in her father's belief in a demanding nature god adds to the strange atmosphere of the story. Anna's conflict between law and order and her love for her father add a lot to the understanding of a complex father-daughter relationship to the natural world.

A haunting, magical story mixed in with crime solving, family drama, suspense, and mystery.

Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for a copy of this book

Code Word Romance by Carlie Walker

Genre: romantic mystery

I like the setting on the Amalfi Coast of Italy, and the plot that involves two women who could be identical twins. Drama follows when Max is asked to impersonate her double, Sofia, a prime minister of a small European country who is on a trip to Italy.

The romantic interest makes the story more interesting, as Max's CIA handler on the trip, Flynn, is a former lover. There is suspense when the two have to flee and hide from would be assassins who want to take out the prime minister Sofia. The book lost me, though, when Max morphs into another personality, suddenly becoming a daredevil involved in drama on the scene. I wish she had remained in her original character, someone who needs Flynn's help to dodge killers while she impersonates Sofia.

I did enjoy the first part of the book, however.

Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for a copy of this book

Currently reading

She Doesn't Have a Clue by Jenny Elder Moke

 Mystery writers meet publishers at an up scale wedding on an island in the Pacific Northwest. This romantic mystery becomes a locked room trope as weather traps them all there with a murderer. I'm enjoying it so far.....

Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for a copy of this book

What are you reading or watching this week?

Memes:  The Sunday Post, It's Monday: What Are You Reading, Sunday Salon, and Stacking the Shelves