The Year of the Cat

A brave process of healing and self reconstruction Observer

'Simply one of the best writers working today. Here's to family, to glamour, and to love'

Nell Frizzell, author of The Panic Years

I looked around at my flat, at the woodchip wallpaper and scuffed furniture, and realised that I did have a life after all. What it didn't have in it was a cat.

When Rhiannon fell in love with, and eventually married her flatmate, she imagined they might one day move on. But this is London in the age of generation rent, and so they share their home with a succession of friends and strangers while saving for a life less makeshift. The desire for a baby is never far from the surface, but can she be sure that she will ever be free of the anxiety she has experienced since an attack in the street one night? And after a childhood spent caring for her autistic brother, does she really want to devote herself to motherhood?

Moving through the seasons over the course of lockdown, The Year of the Cat nimbly charts the way a kitten called Mackerel walked into Rhiannon's home and heart, and taught her to face down her fears and appreciate quite how much love she had to offer.

'A superbly written, special book' Olivia Sudjic, author of Asylum Road

'Beautifully captures that liminal period before any life-changing decision' New Statesman