Cats in books

This is not really a bookish post.  I lost a cat this past weekend.  She was 17 years old, and in the first stages of kidney disease, but she'd just had a check-up and the tests showed that she was stable.  Then Saturday night she started having trouble breathing.  After hours at the emergency vet clinic, they told me it was probably a tumor in her chest, which was confirmed by tests the next day.  Apparently these often develop in older cats, which I never knew.  The tumor she had attached itself to her heart, and there was really nothing to do, except let them end her suffering.  It was so sudden that it has kind of left me in shock, reaching for comfort books (Georgette Heyer, P.G. Wodehouse) and comfort foods (malted milkshakes and chai latte).  My other cat refused to eat for a couple of days, but now she seems less stressed.

On that very long Sunday, waiting for the call about the second tests, I started thinking about cats in books. Making a list of my favorites proved a nice distraction, and later I went trolling through the bookshelves, looking for them.

The first literary cats I met might have been in the Little House books, Black Susan in the Big Woods and then Kitty in the Dakota territory, plus the barn cats in Farmer Boy that Almanzo feeds with warm new milk. These aren't really pets, they are working animals on the farms.  The Ingalls get Kitty after Pa wakes up in the middle of the night with a mouse chewing on his hair, and Susan is the best mouser in the Big Woods.  But the cats also help make their homes cozy, as in the Big Woods:

The sunshine came streaming through the windows into the house, and everything was so neat and pretty  . . .  The pantry door stood wide open, giving the sight and smell of goodies on the shelves, and Black Susan came purring down the stairs from the attic, where she had been taking a nap.

I think Elizabeth Peters has more cats in her books than any author I've read.  In the Amelia series, it begins with the matriarch Bastet, a large brindled Egyptian cat, who bonds with the young Ramses:

[John] followed Ramses' every step and scarcely took his eyes off the boy.  He attended to the needs of Bastet, such as they were; the cat required far less attendance than a human child. (Which is one of the reasons why spinster ladies prefer felines to babies.)  Ramses had not insisted on bringing the cat; he had simply taken it for granted that she would accompany him.  The few occasions on which they had been parted had proved so horrendous for all concerned that I gave in with scarcely a struggle.  (The Mummy Case)

When Bastet dies years later, the family keeps pushing kittens on Ramses, but it takes him a long time to connect with another cat.

There is also the cat-filled mansion of Aunt Kate, in Devil-May-Care, one of my favorite of her books:

       The room was enormous - thirty by fifty feet at the least  . . .  The furniture consisted mainly of chairs and tables; the flat surfaces of both types were covered with objects, many of them cats.
      Henry had never seen so many cats.  Fat cats and lean cats. Short-haired cats and cats that looked like animated mops.  Blue cats, White cats, tabby cats, grey cats. Siamese cats, Persian cats, and cats of no determinate species. Kittens. Cats with long tails, cats with no tails at all.

I bet nobody called Aunt Kate a crazy cat lady!  At least not more than once.

Rumer Godden's Benedictine abbey, in In This House of Brede, has cats as well as nuns.  The young postulant Sister Cecily wanted her convent to have box hedges.  Me, I'd pick mine based on the cats.  There is Wimple, "a Benedictine in her black and white, the white running under her chin, which explained her name."

Wimple too had the nuns on a string, as Sister Priscilla would say.  There was a custom in the community for the nuns, on their way to breakfast after Prime, to stop at the statue of our Lady with the Holy Child in the long cloister, to say three Hail Mary's there.  Wimple was impatient for her breakfast, and she would walk among the kneeling figures, giving them small pushings with her head; one hand after another would come out, not to push her away but to stroke her.  Wimple was perverse; she would come into the refectory through the ever-opening service door and walk through the room to the other, demanding to be let out.  Unlike Grock's, Wimple's miaow was piercing and could, at dinner and supper, interrupt the read, so that Sister Xaviera, who doted on Wimple, would get up and let her out.  In a moment or two the little cat would walk in the service door again.

Philippa Talbot says that in coming to the abbey, she gave up "a cat and a clock and some dear little sins."  The cat is a Siamese called Griffon, and after leaving him in his new home, as she prepares to enter the community, "It was better, Philippa found in the the train, not to let herself think about Griffon."

Kerry Greenwood's mysteries featuring Corinna Chapman are also full of cats.  Corinna herself has three: "Horatio, a tabby and white gentleman with impeccable manners and grooming," and the two in the Mouse Police who keep her bakery rodent-free at night.  Her friend Meroe the witch has the night-black Belladona. When a litter of kittens turns up on the doorstep, their neighbors in the building adopt them all, and the mother as well too. One of the kittens was lost for days and discovered shut into an apartment.  When the door is opened,

       [A] very small, very thin black kitten tottered out, climbed the Professor as if every movement hurt, and nestled in his bosom as though she had been looking for him all her short life.  He cradled her in his beautiful long hands.
       'Hello,' he said to the kitten. She put out a little pink tongue and licked his thumb. Then she closed her eyes and gave a short purr.
       From that point on, of course, the Professor was lost.  He was one of the Chosen Ones.  (Heavenly Pleasures)

And then there is J.K. Rowling, who gives us the evil Mrs Norris, prowling the corridors of Hogwarts at night, just looking for students she can squeal on.  But there is also Crookshanks, Hermione's big ginger cat, on whom she dotes.  He's the only one to sense danger in Scabbers the rat.  But my favorite cat in J.K. Rowling's world is the first one we meet, the tabby cat on the corner of Privet Drive, whom Mr Dursley sees reading a map.  How perfect that Professor McGonagall's Animagus form is a cat, when "This animal form is not chosen by the wizard, but determined by their personality and inner traits."

I actually have a few more fictional cats on my list, but I think I'll stop here, and go sit with my real-life furball for a while, and just be grateful for the wonderful cats who've shared my life, especially my Cassie.

A Christmas mystery in Melbourne

Forbidden Fruit, Kerry Greenwood

Aunt Agatha over at Death in the Stacks recently posted a list of mysteries with a Christmas theme or setting.  That's the kind of thing that always sends me off to my own shelves, to see which of the books I have, or if I can add to the list.  Among the latter is Kerry Greenwood's Forbidden Fruit.  I took it off the shelf just to make sure I had the title right, but I ended up leafing through it.  After reading a page here and there, and realizing that I'd forgotten some of the story, I added it to my own personal Christmas mayhem reading list.

This is the fifth book in Greenwood's series featuring Corinna Chapman, who runs a bakery, Earthly Delights, in Melbourne (I posted about the sixth book, Cooking the Books, back in March).  A zaftig woman very comfortable with herself, Corinna lives above her bakery in a building that combines flats and shops, modeling an ancient Roman insula.  The other residents, some of whom also own businesses in the building, sometimes involve her in mysteries.  At other times she is drawn into helping her gorgeous boyfriend Daniel, a private investigator.  The cases often involve missing persons and generally fall on the cozy side of the spectrum - though one of the residents is a dominatrix who runs a very select dungeon, one which Corinna and Daniel have visited on occasion, and Corinna's Melbourne has the problems of many cities, including a large homeless population.

This book is set during the Christmas season, in the midst of a very hot summer.  The weather does not improve Corinna's slightly "bah humbug" approach to the holiday, particularly its commercialism and the endless carols playing everywhere (I complimented a bank employee today on the lack of carols in their branch).  Daniel's case here involves a high school student who has vanished from her parents' home, where she has been sequestered since her pregnancy was discovered.  Corinna also spends a lot of time in the bakery, where she and her apprentice Jason are turning out special holiday breads, cakes and muffins.  As usual, I was left wishing for a version of Earthly Delights here in Houston.

As always, Corinna works out a solution to the case, but for me the real pleasure is in the characters and their interactions.  I've said before that I'd love to sit down for a cup of tea with Corinna, to talk about favorite books and characters among other things.  In this book she quotes Stephen Maturin; later she and Daniel spend an afternoon reading Terry Pratchett aloud (given the season, I'm sure they were reading Hogfather).  I'm going to be very disappointed, when and if I ever get to Melbourne, not to find Earthly Delights in Calico Alley.

If you're looking for a little holiday mayhem in good company, to my mind you can't do better than Forbidden Fruit.

A baker's holiday

Cooking the Books, Kerry Greenwood

When I signed up for the TBR Double-dare, this was the only new book that I claimed an exemption for. I found out too late about two other books published the very same day, both eagerly-awaited, C.S Harris's When Maidens Mourn  (the latest in a series of Regency mysteries)  and Naomi Novik's Crucible of Gold  (the latest in a series sometimes described as Patrick O'Brian with dragons).  Both are now sitting right here as I type, tempting me.

It's been a long wait for Cooking the Books, the sixth in Kerry Greenwood's series of Corinna Chapman books.  The last, Forbidden Fruits, came out in 2010, and the North American release of this new book comes months after it was published last year in Australia.  Having to wait for this book made me realize again how spoiled I have become, with the global reach of internet buying.

Cooking the Books is a welcome addition to the series.  Set in Melbourne, they feature Corinna, who gave up a career in accounting to become a master bread baker.  She has a very successful bakery called Earthly Delights, and in her spare time she solves crimes with her stunning Israeli partner Daniel, a private investigator.  Corinna lives above her shop, which is on the ground floor of Insula, an apartment building modeled on one from ancient Rome.  The other tenants, some of whom also own businesses in the ground-floor shops, are sometimes clients and sometimes partners in investigation.  They form a surrogate family, and it is always a pleasure to meet them, and their cats, again.

This book actually takes Corinna out of her familiar setting for much of the story.  It opens just after Christmas, when the bakery is closed for a month-long holiday.  A request from an old school friend, which quickly turns into friendly blackmail, leads Corinna to accept a temporary job as a baker for a catering company.  The company is providing the food for a film crew working on a TV soap about a wedding planning business.  Daniel, meanwhile, is helping a young intern at a financial company who has mislaid a set of bearer bonds worth $1 million.  When Corinna discovers that someone at the studio is playing vicious pranks on the Joan Collins-esque star, Daniel is brought in to investigate that as well, and as usual the cases begin to overlap.  In addition to the familiar characters, there is the cast and crew of the soap, as well as the caterers, and all the backstage drama they bring.  Corinna and Daniel also spend a lot of time out and about in Melbourne, tracking a mysterious set of clues, based in nursery rhymes and songs, to locate the bearer bonds.

I have enjoyed every book in this series.  I suppose they would qualify as cozy, since there is little violence, though the urban setting is anything but pastoral.  Corinna's apprentice Jason is a former street kid, a recovering addict, and in this book as in others the city's homeless play an important part in the story.  On the other hand, the surrogate family of the tenants makes Insula a refuge.  Corinna, a zaftig woman comfortable with herself, is someone I'd love to sit down and have a cup of tea with, and I'd really like to wander into her shop for some of her bread.  I am always hungry reading these books (Greenwood includes recipes in the afterwords and on her website).  We could definitely chat about books over tea, since Corinna is a fan of Georgette Heyer, Patrick O'Brian and Terry Pratchett, among others (not to mention Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Doctor Who).

Mysterious immigrants

Raisins and Almonds, Kerry Greenwood
Murphy's Law, Rhys Bowen

This weekend I read two mysteries centering on immigrants.  In Raisins and Almonds, it's Jewish immigrants to Australia in 1928. In Murphy's Law, it's all the mix of immigrants coming into New York City in 1901, with a focus on the Irish.

The Murder by the Book folks have been recommending Kerry Greenwood's Phyrne Fisher series since Cocaine Blues came out in the US. I tried a couple but didn't click with the series. Then I found the Corinna Chapman series, though a Houston Public Library recommendation - and I was hooked in the first few pages. So eventually, having run out of Corinna books, I thought I'd try Phyrne again - starting with the most recently published, Dead Man's Chest.  From there, I went back to the start of the series, and now I'm reading them sort of in order.  Raisins and Almonds is about the murder of a young Jewish man, recently arrived in Australia, which stirs up the Jewish community with fear it may lead to persecutions. It's a mix of immigration concerns, Jewish history, Zionism, kabala, and alchemy - that last three of which I had a hard time following. I did enjoy the usual cast of characters, minus Lin Chung but with the addition of Molly the puppy.  And I envied Miss Sylvia Lee her idyllic life in her used bookstore. I think of Australia as a country of immigrants, like the US - and like the US, not everyone came voluntarily. And the struggle between generations of immigrants, from different parts of the world, may also look like our America history.  I have Bill Bryson's book on Australia; maybe I'll move it up the TBR pile. One small quibble with this series: Phyrne's father's title keeps changing.  In this book, he is a duke - which would make her Lady, not the Hon. Phyrne.

I also found Rhys Bowen through the library - in this case, the Harris County Public Libraries (which are wonderful).  I started with the Lady Georgie series, set in the 1930s.  A friend gave me some of the Evan Evans books (now sadly out of prints), which I liked.  But while I tried one of the Molly Murphy books, like Phyrne, we didn't immediately click.  The last time I was at a signing with Rhys Bowen, though, the MBTB staff were so enthusiastic that I bought the first Molly book - which sat on the TBR pile for five months.  I picked it up Saturday & read it straight through.  The main character, Molly,  flees Ireland after fighting off the landlord's son and leaving him on the kitchen floor. She ends up escorting two children to America, posing as their mother. When a fellow immigrant, also Irish, is murdered on Ellis Island, Molly becomes one of the suspects and becomes involved in the investigation - which is the last thing that a handsome Irish police captain wants.  The New York City setting is really well done, capturing the diversity of the population and the conflicts with and among immigrants.  My only quibble with Molly is that she is awfully familiar with terms like "fingerprints" and "alibi" that probably didn't come up a lot in a small village in Ireland in 1901 - though Molly has apparently read Sherlock Holmes.  I look forward to more of Molly's adventures.

America is a county of immigrants; everyone came here from somewhere else. One of my grandmothers came through Ellis Island in the 1920s. My dad's family moved back & forth to Canada in the early 1900s.  Immigrants built this country, and today they make up a huge if shadowy part of our economy.  I live in Houston, an immigration hub, 50 miles from Galveston, a 19th century immigration port to rival Ellis Island. We need a just immigration policy in this country, and we need to know our own history.