Writers and Their Cats

It's almost a literary cliché: the writer bent over a typewriter or scribbling madly at a desk, with a cat or two curled up nearby. Many writers have paid homage to cats in poetry (T.S. Eliot's Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats) and prose (the multiplying litters of mysteries featuring feline detectives). Journalist Alison Nastasi (Artists and Their Cats), herself a cat lover, has collected photos and stories of 45 cat-fancying writers in the aptly named Writers and Their Cats.

Arranged in alphabetical order by author's first name, Nastasi's brief essays detail the affection these writers have for their feline companions, each with an accompanying photo. The selection includes several well-known cat lovers (Ernest Hemingway earns the title of "unrivalled cat dad"), as well as more contemporary authors like Marlon James. Full of charming anecdotes and feline whimsy, this collection is catnip for lit nerds. --Katie Noah Gibson, blogger at Cakes, Tea and Dreams

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