Micro Review 41

 

The Writer's Cats by Muriel Barbery. Ilus. Maria Guitart & trans. Alison Anderson (Gallic Books)

Gifted copy

Following on from my recent review of Muriel Barbery's A Single Rose the kind people at Gallic Books sent me a copy of her new volume  The Writer's Cats- a book about writing, books and cats how did they know it would appeal to me?

As a bookseller I had a love/hate relationship with little volumes like this, especially at Christmas time. They had to be ordered so far in advance and you could never quite gauge the quantities needed, plus the run away best seller was always one that you'd not predicted.

As a consumer I've become very much more of a fan of this type of book, they do cheer you up and there's always so much detail making rereads a pleasure. It is also  nice to have a picture book for grown ups that isn't just 'adult' in nature.

I know several people who this book would appeal to (and who read this blog) so I am not going to review the book in case it spoils any Christmas surprises but this was a delight to read and so whimsically funny that it left me smiling for a long time after reaching the end.

Should we ever get another cat (or 2, or 4) then I'll definitely refer back to this book for name suggestions.

Many thanks to Isabelle and the team at Gallic Books for the copy - the book is published this month and will make a lovely gift for cat loving authors/readers.