Talk Back

[alyson]

Note: sorry I cram all my reviews together, instead of writing them as soon as I finish the books. C'est la vie. -- Alyson

Reading this book was an intriguing experience, or else exasperating.

The autobiographical story is of a somewhat anti-social man finding a stray cat, and how he finds himself changing his life-view because of it. The man is the more interesting character of the two, but sometimes in spite of his writing rather than because of it.

I have a friend who lives on someone else's property, in a skanky trailer that he may have never cleaned, and for all I know he may have never given me his real name. He's gruff, opinionated, irritable, loud, and sometimes just a little scary; but he has a good heart, and if you can sort through what he says to what he does, it's hard not to like him.

I think this book has the same sort of character -- the intellectual loner version. Every damn thing the author's cat does sends him into long, long spirals of speculation about heredity and Darwin and behavioral analysis and dogs vs. cats and the meaning of respect and linguistics and domination issues, until you just want to smack him.

But how can you help but like him? He loves this cat and is really trying hard, with all of his mighty brain, to figure out what to do about it. He can barely tolerate people, and doesn't have intuition to help him "get" his cat, but he's willing to make a solid try using analysis if it means he can keep its company. It's nice, as a reader, to be able to watch.

Ok. So I say: try this book. It's full of itself and will talk your ear off, but it's a sweetie if you get to know it.

[shaw]

Is this an old or a new book?

[Bea]

I saw this a while back ago and didn't have enough cash to pick it up from the bookstore. Then promptly forgot about it.

Thanks for reminding me to tack it onto the to do list!

[alyson]

I can't answer your question, Dr Shaw, because it was a library book and is now out of my hands. I'd guess it was written fairly recently, say within the last ten or twenty years...