Cattitude - Episode 295 You Only Live Nine Times - Crime, Claws & Coconut Oil (Okay… Wesson Oil)

<v Speaker 1>Live. This is pet Life Radio. Let's Talk Pets.
<v Speaker 2>Hello, feline friends, Welcome to Katatude. I'm your show host
<v Speaker 2>Michelle Burne. Now, who among us cat lovers does not
<v Speaker 2>love a good cat book, right, and especially when there's
<v Speaker 2>a little mystery. I really love this book. I am
<v Speaker 2>so excited to have this New York Times bestselling author
<v Speaker 2>on our show. So stay tuned. We'll be right back.
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<v Speaker 2>Welcome back everyone. I'd like to welcome Gwen Cooper. As
<v Speaker 2>I mentioned, Chi's a New York Times bestselling author, and
<v Speaker 2>so Gwen with their cats, Clayton and Fanny write these
<v Speaker 2>amazing books. So welcome Gwen. I'm so happy to have
<v Speaker 2>you on Catitude.
<v Speaker 5>Thank you so much for having me.
<v Speaker 2>So obviously, Clayton and Fanny just desist. But can you
<v Speaker 2>give a little bit about your background and then tell
<v Speaker 2>us about your cats?
<v Speaker 5>Yeah? Sure.
<v Speaker 6>So I've been a writer for a while now. Some
<v Speaker 6>of your listeners are probably familiar with my memoir Homer's Odyssey,
<v Speaker 6>A Fearless view line tail or How I Learned about
<v Speaker 6>Love and Life with a blind wonder Cat.
<v Speaker 5>So that book came out a few years ago. I
<v Speaker 5>wrote a couple of follow up books.
<v Speaker 6>I also wrote a novel called Love Saves the Day,
<v Speaker 6>which is narrated mostly from a cat's point of view.
<v Speaker 5>And you guess, so that's what I do.
<v Speaker 6>I also am very passionate about animal rescue, and I
<v Speaker 6>to do a lot of work with the animal rescue
<v Speaker 6>organizations in the US and also around the world. Seems
<v Speaker 6>to be a lot more natural disasters these days, so
<v Speaker 6>there's sort of always somebody who needs a little bit
<v Speaker 6>more of a platform. Yeah, I feel like now I'm
<v Speaker 6>just rambling a little bit but that's pretty much my
<v Speaker 6>deal that that's who I am, that's what I do.
<v Speaker 2>Thanks for sharing that. Now we're going to talk about
<v Speaker 2>your new book, which is you Own We Live Nine Times. Yes,
<v Speaker 2>I love the title.
<v Speaker 5>Thank you.
<v Speaker 2>Before I asked you about the book, what inspired you
<v Speaker 2>as a writer to have cats, as they're not always
<v Speaker 2>the center character, but they're subcenter. How would you say.
<v Speaker 5>That feline detectives?
<v Speaker 6>How to What inspired me to write to write a
<v Speaker 6>novel in which talking cats solve a murder?
<v Speaker 5>I think is is that that's a good way to
<v Speaker 5>get it. Yes, I will add by the way the
<v Speaker 5>cats talk to each other, not to the humans around them.
<v Speaker 5>This is not like a doctor do a little thing.
<v Speaker 6>There's no supernatural cats who are supernatural humans who can
<v Speaker 6>like mind meld with cats. The cats talk to each other,
<v Speaker 6>the humans talk to each other. The cats try to
<v Speaker 6>figure out ways to get the humans to know what
<v Speaker 6>they're doing. But getting back to your question, so again,
<v Speaker 6>those who have read Homer's Odyssey will be familiar with
<v Speaker 6>this story. But back when I had a couple of
<v Speaker 6>years after I had adopted Homer, who was a blind cat,
<v Speaker 6>I had just moved into to my new apartment. It
<v Speaker 6>was my first apartment that I was living in by myself,
<v Speaker 6>without my parents, without a roommate, and I woke up
<v Speaker 6>at four o'clock in the morning one day and there
<v Speaker 6>was a strange man standing at the foot of my bed.
<v Speaker 6>I will not you can read the entire story in
<v Speaker 6>Homer's honesty, but suffice it to say that Homer, who
<v Speaker 6>was a very small black cat, but who was really fearless,
<v Speaker 6>and he was an incredibly friendly cat, but he seemed
<v Speaker 6>to sense that this man was dangerous and he attacked
<v Speaker 6>the man, who turned and ran out of my apartment,
<v Speaker 6>and we called the police, and in the end everything
<v Speaker 6>was okay thanks to Homer. So this idea of Homer
<v Speaker 6>as a crime fighting cat has sort of always been
<v Speaker 6>in the back of my mind. And yeah, a couple
<v Speaker 6>of years ago, I thought it would be a really
<v Speaker 6>fun idea to write this cozy mystery series. And it's
<v Speaker 6>set in my native Miami Beach. Born and raised to
<v Speaker 6>Miami Beach, and I spent a number of years living
<v Speaker 6>on South Beach in the nineties, so the book is
<v Speaker 6>set during that time. South Beach was very much like
<v Speaker 6>a small I mean it was it's still small time.
<v Speaker 2>I don't know about now because we're I'm based in
<v Speaker 2>South Florida, I don't know about okay, how so much.
<v Speaker 6>But it was and so you know exactly what I'm
<v Speaker 6>talking about. In Southeach, it's like two square miles. It's tiny,
<v Speaker 6>and back in the nineties it was very much like
<v Speaker 6>you knew everyone and everyone knew you, and it was
<v Speaker 6>a very small town kind of vibe. And it just
<v Speaker 6>seemed like a fun idea, especially because I know this
<v Speaker 6>is like everybody my age says about the time when
<v Speaker 6>they were in their twenties, but it just seems like
<v Speaker 6>the nineties was a much you know, it was just
<v Speaker 6>things were a lot less.
<v Speaker 5>I don't know, everyone seemed a lot friendlier back in
<v Speaker 5>the nineties.
<v Speaker 6>So yeah, so it just seemed like a fun idea
<v Speaker 6>to set this novel circa nineteen ninety eight in South
<v Speaker 6>Beach and to have cats solving a murder, which is
<v Speaker 6>also what it came together.
<v Speaker 2>Okay, Well, first of all, I'm glad Homer attacked that man.
<v Speaker 2>That is an incredible story.
<v Speaker 5>It was truly an incredible cat he really was.
<v Speaker 2>Wow. Yes, I am going to read Homer's odysty because
<v Speaker 2>I have not not that I can recall. I don't
<v Speaker 2>always remember the books I read and then I reread them,
<v Speaker 2>which is not a bad thing.
<v Speaker 6>That happens to me all the time, by the way.
<v Speaker 2>So I love the setting. I love how you have
<v Speaker 2>the cats talking to each other and also to the
<v Speaker 2>one dog. I think they do actually really speak to
<v Speaker 2>each other in their own way.
<v Speaker 5>I would actually tend to agree with that. I really do.
<v Speaker 5>I feel that.
<v Speaker 6>I mean, obviously, animals have ways of communicating with each
<v Speaker 6>other that are not going to be known to us,
<v Speaker 6>because why would they be. I mean, they don't, just
<v Speaker 6>like they don't understand what we are saying to each other.
<v Speaker 5>So this is my theory as well.
<v Speaker 2>Some people beg to different everybody has different opinions, but
<v Speaker 2>I think they understand each other better than my cat
<v Speaker 2>might not understand me, or cheese is not, or my
<v Speaker 2>cats rather or cheese is not to understand me.
<v Speaker 6>Well, that is the eternal question, of course with cats.
<v Speaker 6>Do they not understand or do they choose not to understand.
<v Speaker 6>I've caught my cats understanding more than they would probably
<v Speaker 6>like me to know.
<v Speaker 5>They do.
<v Speaker 2>Yes, that's the key. Okay, let's get back to what
<v Speaker 2>inspired you to write you only lived nine times.
<v Speaker 5>You know.
<v Speaker 6>I had the idea very spontaneously a few years ago.
<v Speaker 6>I honestly don't remember what the initial impetus was. I
<v Speaker 6>had not yet at that time read really any cozy mysteries.
<v Speaker 5>I know that there is.
<v Speaker 6>An entire subgenre of cozy mysteries with cats, and I
<v Speaker 6>had not at that point read any of those books.
<v Speaker 6>But it was a spontaneous idea that I had, and
<v Speaker 6>I just kind of you know, Homer still has a
<v Speaker 6>very active social media community, and so I just kind
<v Speaker 6>of floated the idea there and people were very enthusiastic,
<v Speaker 6>and I was like, Okay, you know what, I'm going
<v Speaker 6>to do this. And then for two years I was
<v Speaker 6>so intimidated at the thought of doing it because I'm
<v Speaker 6>not a puzzle person. I've never written anything even close
<v Speaker 6>to a mystery, and I was pretty sure I could
<v Speaker 6>not do it. I was just really really intimidated. And
<v Speaker 6>then one day last year, I told myself, look, it's
<v Speaker 6>been like three years since you first talked about this,
<v Speaker 6>so you're in and you're out. You're either gonna do
<v Speaker 6>this or you got to tell everyone that you were
<v Speaker 6>just talking and you didn't really mean it, and I
<v Speaker 6>didn't like that idea, so I decided it was less
<v Speaker 6>scary to try to write the novel.
<v Speaker 2>Well, I think you did a good job, because I
<v Speaker 2>do read a lot of recording this right before Halloween
<v Speaker 2>and that's coming up. But I'm not a fan of
<v Speaker 2>gore and horror and that kind of stuff. But I
<v Speaker 2>neither am I, by the way, not my thing, but
<v Speaker 2>like going into some haunted place where people jumping out
<v Speaker 2>would be like no, no, not for me either, But
<v Speaker 2>novels and you know, mysteries and all that. Fine with that.
<v Speaker 2>James Patterson is one of my favorite authors, but his
<v Speaker 2>early stuff, so I love when there's a twist also,
<v Speaker 2>but we'll get to that a little later. Why did
<v Speaker 2>you choose that title? What made you decide you only
<v Speaker 2>lived nine times?
<v Speaker 5>It just so spontaneously occurred.
<v Speaker 6>I mean again, as soon as I had the idea
<v Speaker 6>for writing a cozy mystery novel in which Homer or
<v Speaker 6>Homer and his two sisters would in some way solve
<v Speaker 6>a murder, at that same moment, I had the idea
<v Speaker 6>for the title. I can't even really tell you how
<v Speaker 6>it popped. It just popped into my head. It was
<v Speaker 6>not a thought process. It was not like I sat
<v Speaker 6>down and I will tell you that for the second
<v Speaker 6>book in the series, which I am already at work on,
<v Speaker 6>which is called The Cat War Black, and I was
<v Speaker 6>looking at my shelf. You know, I've read some more
<v Speaker 6>mysteries since I decided to write this. In the last
<v Speaker 6>few years, I have read more, and I've write not
<v Speaker 6>just cozy mysteries but others, and I've really gotten to
<v Speaker 6>enjoy Cornell Woolrich.
<v Speaker 5>So I saw him kind of sitting on the shelf
<v Speaker 5>and the bridewar black, and I was like, ah, the cat.
<v Speaker 6>He is a black cat, the Catwar Black, and you know,
<v Speaker 6>so that's there, you go, that's how that happened.
<v Speaker 2>Yes, obviously Patterson's not cozy mystery, but I like cozy
<v Speaker 2>mysteries too, So there's not many books I don't like.
<v Speaker 5>I'm kind of right there with you on that.
<v Speaker 6>Actually, as long as it's you know, a paper with
<v Speaker 6>words between covers, I'm in right.
<v Speaker 2>Although there are sometimes books where I won't really jive
<v Speaker 2>with the voice.
<v Speaker 6>Absolutely well, it's a very personal thing and ultimately an
<v Speaker 6>author's voice I think you need. You know, every art form,
<v Speaker 6>every mode of creative expression, has its strength and its weaknesses.
<v Speaker 6>I think, what are the great strengths of writing? And
<v Speaker 6>if books is that it's very intimate, it's a voice
<v Speaker 6>in your head. And if it's not a voice that
<v Speaker 6>you like having in your head, then you got to
<v Speaker 6>just get rid of it. You got to close the
<v Speaker 6>book and move on to the next one.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah. Yeah, I try to force myself through, but at
<v Speaker 2>times it's like, Okay, this is it.
<v Speaker 5>Life is too short for bad books.
<v Speaker 2>Yes, that'll be a good T shirt. So let's talk
<v Speaker 2>about different perspectives that you wanted to explore. So you
<v Speaker 2>have a character in the book that talks to the
<v Speaker 2>casts that's not a cat.
<v Speaker 5>Well, there's a dog and there is a bird.
<v Speaker 6>I think in terms of actually being able to speak
<v Speaker 6>directly with the cats, I think that's it.
<v Speaker 5>The animals can all talk to each other.
<v Speaker 6>I do like to feel that Rachel, who's my human protagonist,
<v Speaker 6>and she is Homer and Scarlet, and there's the other
<v Speaker 6>two cats who Homer lives with homeer Scarlet and Vashdi,
<v Speaker 6>and she is there human. So I do like to
<v Speaker 6>feel that there is kind of a really good unspoken
<v Speaker 6>communication between them.
<v Speaker 5>But ultimately Rachel.
<v Speaker 6>Is not able to have conversations with the cats, like
<v Speaker 6>the one that you and I are having right.
<v Speaker 2>Now, okay, and I get that are any of the
<v Speaker 2>situations in the book based on any of the occurrences
<v Speaker 2>that have happened between you and your cats? Like do
<v Speaker 2>you have a dumbwaiter in your house or no? So
<v Speaker 2>most people don't unless you have an older house.
<v Speaker 6>Yees, So I had to you know, this was one
<v Speaker 6>of actually the challenges, and this was one thing that
<v Speaker 6>really because then there are also practical considerations in writing
<v Speaker 6>the book. I'm writing these three cats who people know,
<v Speaker 6>but I'm writing them with a human who is in
<v Speaker 6>some ways based on me, but it is ultimately not me.
<v Speaker 6>And people who know my cats know that they have
<v Speaker 6>always been strictly into our cats. But if the cats
<v Speaker 6>are going to investigate murders without their human knowing about it,
<v Speaker 6>there has to be a way for them to get
<v Speaker 6>out of their home without her knowing. And really that
<v Speaker 6>took me a little while to come up with the
<v Speaker 6>mechanism by which the cats are ultimately able to sneak
<v Speaker 6>out of the house without Rachel knowing that that was
<v Speaker 6>not as immediate as the title or the idea for
<v Speaker 6>the book that was actually something that took some thought
<v Speaker 6>over a period of time.
<v Speaker 5>You know, something that would be just believable.
<v Speaker 6>It doesn't have to really be completely believable, just plausible
<v Speaker 6>enough that people are like, Okay, I could see it,
<v Speaker 6>it could happen.
<v Speaker 2>And there's some other antics that are could that really happen?
<v Speaker 2>And you think about it and though, yeah, it probably could.
<v Speaker 2>I'm not going to give boy all details, but the oil,
<v Speaker 2>I don't want to get into it, but the situation
<v Speaker 2>with the oil, and I hope this doesn't say so much,
<v Speaker 2>but I actually did wash Dennis because he's part man coon.
<v Speaker 2>Say he's like a dog, part dog cat. And I
<v Speaker 2>only say that because he's pretty chill. But that's yeah,
<v Speaker 2>that's not easy.
<v Speaker 5>I will say.
<v Speaker 7>So.
<v Speaker 6>There's a scene where one of the cats get stuck
<v Speaker 6>in their mode of escape and so they deploy Wesson
<v Speaker 6>oil to help ease her out. But I will say
<v Speaker 6>that I one and there are always people who are
<v Speaker 6>whorder mystery Ficinado's what will tell you what Some of
<v Speaker 6>the rules of the genre are. One rule that I
<v Speaker 6>set for myself, and it was a very strict no
<v Speaker 6>cheating rule that anything I had the cats do had
<v Speaker 6>to be something that cats could actually do that they
<v Speaker 6>did not. Suddenly, you know, I didn't want them to
<v Speaker 6>be able to read a name, or I mean to
<v Speaker 6>do something that would would genuinely be beyond.
<v Speaker 5>The skills or physical abilities of a cat.
<v Speaker 6>So everything that cats do in the book is something
<v Speaker 6>that a cat could do in real life. And maybe
<v Speaker 6>you will start to wonder why your cats are doing
<v Speaker 6>some of the inexplicable, seemingly inexplicable things that they're doing
<v Speaker 6>when you.
<v Speaker 5>See the thought process with the cats in the book out.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, it does get you thinking, we're going to take
<v Speaker 2>a short break and we'll be right back. Real people,
<v Speaker 2>real stories.
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<v Speaker 1>Life Radio Headline Radio.
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<v Speaker 2>Welcome back everyone. We're talking to Gwen Cooper, who is
<v Speaker 2>a New York Times bestselling author and we're talking about
<v Speaker 2>her book You Only Live Nine Times? So do you
<v Speaker 2>have a favorite character in your book?
<v Speaker 5>I will tell you.
<v Speaker 7>So.
<v Speaker 6>There is one character in the book who is there
<v Speaker 6>to bed to be disliked. He's like if you've ever
<v Speaker 6>like seen in kids like a puppet, you know, a
<v Speaker 6>punch and Judy pappat show. He's the one who's there
<v Speaker 6>for you to say boo boo. You know, every time
<v Speaker 6>you love to hate him, he is there for you
<v Speaker 6>to love to hate him. And he might be and
<v Speaker 6>it's very obvious when you read the book who he is.
<v Speaker 6>He's like a villain, but he's a comical villain, so
<v Speaker 6>you know, he's the chill Meil basically. And I have
<v Speaker 6>to say, I really do love him. I love this character. First,
<v Speaker 6>you know, I started off loving to hate him and
<v Speaker 6>and now he just cracks me up. I think he's
<v Speaker 6>a big I really wanted the book to be fun,
<v Speaker 6>and I think he is actually a big part of
<v Speaker 6>what makes the book fun. He develops this intense rivalry
<v Speaker 6>with the snootiest of the three cats at the center
<v Speaker 6>of the story, and he always sees coming this from
<v Speaker 6>this rivalry from a very human perspective, and she's coming
<v Speaker 6>at it from a very feline perspective. I think anybody
<v Speaker 6>listening to this knows what a snooty cat who really
<v Speaker 6>does not like a specific person.
<v Speaker 5>How intense that can be.
<v Speaker 6>And I actually think it's one of the most fun
<v Speaker 6>parts of the books that I did not originally conceptualize
<v Speaker 6>when I've sat down to write the book. But this
<v Speaker 6>character sort of kept intruding himself and I finally let
<v Speaker 6>him in, and I am very glad that I did.
<v Speaker 2>So, you know that brings me this question. I've read
<v Speaker 2>quite a few books on that authors have written on
<v Speaker 2>how they write, and I've heard over and over again
<v Speaker 2>because it's on my bucket list to write a book.
<v Speaker 2>I don't know if it'll happen, but hopefully, but I've
<v Speaker 2>heard that sometimes you have the characters, you have everything,
<v Speaker 2>the scenario, your protagonist, everything, and then the book kind
<v Speaker 2>of writes itself. Things change.
<v Speaker 6>I would say for me, it's so there are some
<v Speaker 6>writers who and every writer has a philosophy on this.
<v Speaker 6>I think, you know, Stephen King is very anti outlined.
<v Speaker 6>He is very much at the school you sit down
<v Speaker 6>and you start following the characters around basically, and they
<v Speaker 6>reveal themselves to you.
<v Speaker 5>And then I know there are writers who are very
<v Speaker 5>intense about outlines.
<v Speaker 6>I would not have had the nerve to sit down
<v Speaker 6>to start, you know, I'm kind of in the middle
<v Speaker 6>with this book. I would not have had the nerve
<v Speaker 6>to sit down and start writing a murder mystery without
<v Speaker 6>knowing who the killer was going to be generally, and
<v Speaker 6>some of this did change, you know, in some of
<v Speaker 6>the details, but in the broadest strokes, I always knew
<v Speaker 6>who the killer was. I always knew what the clues
<v Speaker 6>leading to that person. I always knew what the red
<v Speaker 6>herrings were going to be. But having said that, a
<v Speaker 6>lot of who the characters were, a lot of the
<v Speaker 6>stuff in the town.
<v Speaker 5>You know.
<v Speaker 6>The great thing about a cozy mystery is that it's
<v Speaker 6>not just about the murder. It's about a town. It's
<v Speaker 6>about the people in the town. It's the characters who
<v Speaker 6>inhabit it. If you've done your job as a cozy
<v Speaker 6>mystery writer, people should be like, you know, despite the murders,
<v Speaker 6>I would really love to live in this town and
<v Speaker 6>hang out with these people. And so my cast of characters,
<v Speaker 6>you know, especially the supporting characters, that was much more
<v Speaker 6>of an organic kind of a process. Where as I
<v Speaker 6>was writing people, you know, some of the characters surprised
<v Speaker 6>me in some ways, and I went with it, and
<v Speaker 6>and I think the book is better for it.
<v Speaker 2>It's a great book, really really did really great book.
<v Speaker 2>In writing and living with cats. What is the one
<v Speaker 2>thing that you wish people understood more about cats? So
<v Speaker 2>it could be, you know, people that have cats that
<v Speaker 2>not all of us that have cats know everything about cats.
<v Speaker 2>Or it could be just you know, we have listeners
<v Speaker 2>that don't have cats that want to have cats, or
<v Speaker 2>just like listening. So thank you for listening. But what
<v Speaker 2>would you like people to know?
<v Speaker 6>So I would never presume to speak to other cat people,
<v Speaker 6>because I'm definitely one of those people who I feel like,
<v Speaker 6>you know, the only thing I really know about cats
<v Speaker 6>is that I know nothing about cats, sort of. That
<v Speaker 6>could be Really, I have people who write to me
<v Speaker 6>all the time, and they have very intense questions, and
<v Speaker 6>I always have to say I always have to preface
<v Speaker 6>anything that I say with I am ultimately a an
<v Speaker 6>expert in my own cats, and even that is really
<v Speaker 6>barely an expertise. But that having been said, it is
<v Speaker 6>only surprising to me how surprising it is to people
<v Speaker 6>who aren't cat people how very differentiated cat's personalities are.
<v Speaker 6>And having lived with both cats and dogs, I would
<v Speaker 6>say I have seen more variety in cats personalities than
<v Speaker 6>in dogs, which is not to be dismissive of dogs
<v Speaker 6>or say that I've not seen variety and personality. But
<v Speaker 6>you know one thing I really do try to show
<v Speaker 6>in this book. There are five cat characters, three central
<v Speaker 6>characters and two kind of friends from the neighborhood, and
<v Speaker 6>each one of them has a very different personality, a
<v Speaker 6>very different worldview, a very different conception of their relationships
<v Speaker 6>with each other with humans. Again, I think that is
<v Speaker 6>something and maybe this is also for people who live
<v Speaker 6>with cats to not get frustrated when cats don't conform
<v Speaker 6>behavior really to how you think they should be in acting.
<v Speaker 6>It really is not only easier, it's actually better to
<v Speaker 6>kind of let the cat lead you a little bit
<v Speaker 6>in that sense, and pay attention to what they are
<v Speaker 6>telling you about themselves. Again, I don't mean like literally
<v Speaker 6>talking in words, but just like with people, cats will
<v Speaker 6>eventually show you who they are if you give them
<v Speaker 6>the space in which to do so.
<v Speaker 2>Very true, and I agree with you on the personalities.
<v Speaker 2>I had always had dogs, and then Dennis adopted me,
<v Speaker 2>and then Moore came. So once I had five, two
<v Speaker 2>were more community, but we took care of them. They
<v Speaker 2>were still outdoor, So three indoor, two outdoor, and each
<v Speaker 2>one very distinct personalities. So that you have to pay
<v Speaker 2>attention and learn who they are. But yes, very distinct.
<v Speaker 2>So I kind of agree with that. Do you think
<v Speaker 2>readers might be more influenced to adopt a cat, especially
<v Speaker 2>more than one cat, after reading your book?
<v Speaker 5>You know what?
<v Speaker 6>I were sat down to write Homer's Odyssey and it
<v Speaker 6>was my second book, and the literary agent I had,
<v Speaker 6>who had sold my first book, was incredibly discouraging about
<v Speaker 6>the idea of writing Homer's Odyssey.
<v Speaker 5>And I went on a little bit of a journey
<v Speaker 5>with that.
<v Speaker 6>I talked to some people and found other people who
<v Speaker 6>had blind cats.
<v Speaker 5>I just wanted to get to send You know, is
<v Speaker 5>he right?
<v Speaker 6>Is this a terrible idea for a book? Is this
<v Speaker 6>a terrible story that nobody's going to want to hear?
<v Speaker 6>And you know, we sort of all came to the
<v Speaker 6>conclusion that if a book like Homer's Odyssey could persuade
<v Speaker 6>even one person to adopt one, if one blind cat
<v Speaker 6>ended up with a home who otherwise would not have
<v Speaker 6>had one, then it was worth at least trying to
<v Speaker 6>write this book and get it published.
<v Speaker 5>You know, I never know.
<v Speaker 6>Ultimately, I don't think anybody really knows what ultimately moves
<v Speaker 6>somebody to make a decision like that. But I do
<v Speaker 6>always hope in my writing, and especially when I write
<v Speaker 6>about now that Homer's is almost like a character. But
<v Speaker 6>when I write about a special needs cat, and certainly
<v Speaker 6>when I worried about rescue cats, I always, in the
<v Speaker 6>back of my mind want to show what I think
<v Speaker 6>it incredibly enriching and rewarding experience it can be, even
<v Speaker 6>if it's not to adopt a special needs cat specifically,
<v Speaker 6>but just to get out of the one rigid idea
<v Speaker 6>box you have of what a certain kind of relationship
<v Speaker 6>has to look like. And so I guess I always
<v Speaker 6>have it in my head, I, you know, the hope
<v Speaker 6>that somebody might be persuaded in that direction. I don't
<v Speaker 6>know whether that happens, and when it does, I think
<v Speaker 6>it ultimately is a culmination effect. A lot of other
<v Speaker 6>things obviously go into making a decision like this, So
<v Speaker 6>you know, maybe it's just like a little push.
<v Speaker 2>A little push is good, and especially about adopting a
<v Speaker 2>special needs cat, and I think also adopting and keeping
<v Speaker 2>a misunderstood cat that's the same.
<v Speaker 5>I agree with you, Yes.
<v Speaker 2>I don't think any of your characters really fit that.
<v Speaker 2>Why do mine. Cats fit that role. But she was
<v Speaker 2>feral adopted four months in Charlotte nine years. Still doesn't
<v Speaker 2>know what a letter box is. But that's not what
<v Speaker 2>this story this is about. But she's misunderstood. So if
<v Speaker 2>we were too, I don't think you return, you know,
<v Speaker 2>you adopt, but she adopted me. But I think that
<v Speaker 2>I'm earning karma points someplace. But we you know, she's
<v Speaker 2>just has issues. And while she's not distabled except in
<v Speaker 2>her mind a little bit.
<v Speaker 6>This is this is her way of communicating, right I
<v Speaker 6>actually so, I wrote a book and it's an essay collection.
<v Speaker 6>It's called My Life in a Cat House and one
<v Speaker 6>of the story, one of the essays in that is
<v Speaker 6>called the Picasso of p And that story is about
<v Speaker 6>my cat, Vashti, who, in real life, not in the book,
<v Speaker 6>but in real life, you used her own urine as
<v Speaker 6>a very expressive method of communication over the years.
<v Speaker 5>And so I do feel you on this one. I
<v Speaker 5>do not know what you're.
<v Speaker 6>She she had very specific insecurities and concerns, and she liked
<v Speaker 6>to send a message, let's say.
<v Speaker 5>So I do appreciate that too, you know.
<v Speaker 6>Again, and that's part of why I say that cats
<v Speaker 6>all have very different personalities, and they do if you
<v Speaker 6>want to be a cat person, they do force you
<v Speaker 6>to pay attention.
<v Speaker 5>But I think that's a good thing.
<v Speaker 6>I actually think that's why so many writers gravitate toward cats,
<v Speaker 6>because to be a good writer, you also have to
<v Speaker 6>pay attention to You have to pay attention to others
<v Speaker 6>and get a sense of why they're doing what they're
<v Speaker 6>doing in order to create believable characters. And living with
<v Speaker 6>cats I think forces you to do that, to pay
<v Speaker 6>close attention.
<v Speaker 5>Certainly to try to figure out what your cat. You know,
<v Speaker 5>why your cat's to doing what they're doing.
<v Speaker 2>Right, And I'm still trying to figure her out. I
<v Speaker 2>like that though, because of fee. I'm going to keep
<v Speaker 2>that in mind because I'm a big art fand too,
<v Speaker 2>so can you give us a little hint about what
<v Speaker 2>your next book is going to be? It's what the
<v Speaker 2>Cat Wore Black.
<v Speaker 6>It is called the cad War Black. It will be
<v Speaker 6>Homer who Done It? Number two? It is going to
<v Speaker 6>take place or it's gonna be set among the high
<v Speaker 6>stakes world of high fashion modeling. In this you know,
<v Speaker 6>small coastal town that resembles South Beach.
<v Speaker 5>And I'm still working through it, I do. It's gonna
<v Speaker 5>be a lot of fun.
<v Speaker 6>I know that sounds really lame, but I have just
<v Speaker 6>actually yesterday finished my preliminary sketching out just where I
<v Speaker 6>you know, one of the first steps that I take.
<v Speaker 6>It's not an outline, but I just kind of sit
<v Speaker 6>down and in three thousand words, I write the whole
<v Speaker 6>plot of the book, beginning to end. And I just
<v Speaker 6>finished doing that yesterday. I'm so excited about this one,
<v Speaker 6>and I'm so looking forward to writing these characters, to
<v Speaker 6>bringing back the original cats. I'm also introducing an amazing
<v Speaker 6>new feline character. I'm just so in love with her already,
<v Speaker 6>and I really think readers are gonna like her too.
<v Speaker 6>So there will be six cats in this book in
<v Speaker 6>addition to all the other characters. So the feline cast
<v Speaker 6>is growing, but they are all very different from each other.
<v Speaker 6>And this new edition, her name is Celia, and Celia
<v Speaker 6>is amazing, So he is the best.
<v Speaker 5>I'm really excited to write art.
<v Speaker 2>Well, I'm excited to read the ear book. I can't
<v Speaker 2>wait for to be published. But I have a question. Well,
<v Speaker 2>we have you have our listening audience. Tell them why
<v Speaker 2>should they buy your book?
<v Speaker 6>Oh you know, I really do think if you are
<v Speaker 6>the right person for this book, if you like cozy mysteries,
<v Speaker 6>if you like cozy mysteries with cats, I think it's
<v Speaker 6>a lot of fun. I just think it's a really fun,
<v Speaker 6>escapist read that is in no way stupid or insulting
<v Speaker 6>to the intelligence.
<v Speaker 5>Of the readers. I actually think it's smart.
<v Speaker 6>I really did work hard on the actual mystery so
<v Speaker 6>far readers, not just my existing readers, but actually you know,
<v Speaker 6>I've put this up for a review on some of
<v Speaker 6>you know, mystery book review websites and have been getting
<v Speaker 6>really good feedback.
<v Speaker 5>So it's a good mystery.
<v Speaker 6>And if the idea of spending like a couple of
<v Speaker 6>weeks on Miami Beach in nineteen ninety eight with some
<v Speaker 6>amazing cats hits you on all the right levels, you
<v Speaker 6>will definitely enjoy this book. If you are looking for
<v Speaker 6>just an escape from all the depressing news, you will
<v Speaker 6>really like this book. If you like feline hijinks, I
<v Speaker 6>think you'll really like this book. And I'm really I'm
<v Speaker 6>not usually this good a cheerleader from my books.
<v Speaker 5>To tell you the church, it's a really good book.
<v Speaker 2>And also just to interject, I would not know this
<v Speaker 2>is your first cozy mystery because it's not blatant. So
<v Speaker 2>there's twists like it which make it even more interesting.
<v Speaker 5>Yeah. I always like twists, you know.
<v Speaker 6>That's I mean, that's the fun of it, right, And
<v Speaker 6>but I do, you know, try to lay the groundwork
<v Speaker 6>like I never. I mean, this is the thing I think.
<v Speaker 6>You also have to be careful.
<v Speaker 5>I am not.
<v Speaker 6>I'm not a writer. I'm not trying to be smarter
<v Speaker 6>than my readers. I assume my readers are as smart
<v Speaker 6>as I am, So I like to get them there
<v Speaker 6>before the characters get there, but not as quickly as
<v Speaker 6>they think they've gotten there, you know.
<v Speaker 5>So it's so it's a fun reveal.
<v Speaker 2>Goodwill Where can people find out more about you and
<v Speaker 2>your book?
<v Speaker 5>So the best place is too.
<v Speaker 6>I have actually my own shop online where I sell
<v Speaker 6>directly to my readers, and I donate ten percent of
<v Speaker 6>everything that I earn there to organizations that rescue abused,
<v Speaker 6>abandoned and disabled animals, and they can find that at
<v Speaker 6>shop dot gwen Cooper dot com. Having said that, you
<v Speaker 6>can certainly that the book is available everywhere books are sold.
<v Speaker 6>If your bookstore does not have it in they can
<v Speaker 6>or it for you. You can buy it on Amazon,
<v Speaker 6>you can get the e book on you know, Apple,
<v Speaker 6>et cetera, et cetera.
<v Speaker 5>It is available.
<v Speaker 6>The ebook is available for check out through libraries. Again,
<v Speaker 6>your library may or may not have a physical copy,
<v Speaker 6>but they should be able to get you an ebook copy.
<v Speaker 6>So basically you can find it anywhere. But again, I
<v Speaker 6>do sell it for less in my store than it
<v Speaker 6>has sold other places, and you, in purchasing it directly
<v Speaker 6>for me, are also supporting rescue organizations. Right now, I
<v Speaker 6>am donating. I'm making most of my donations to Cobble
<v Speaker 6>Small Animal Rescue in Cobble, Afghanistan, which is run by
<v Speaker 6>an American woman who is its founder named Charlotte Maxwell Jones,
<v Speaker 6>who was just doing unbelievable rescue work under unimaginable circumstances.
<v Speaker 2>Oh, I applaud you for doing that, for giving back,
<v Speaker 2>that's wonderful, So thank you so much for that. Listeners
<v Speaker 2>Shop dot Gwen Cooper dot com and Gwen, I want
<v Speaker 2>to thank you so much for coming on Catitude.
<v Speaker 5>Thank you so much for having me. It's been really fun.
<v Speaker 2>Cat Levers, I hope you enjoyed this show. What a
<v Speaker 2>great book. Please be sure to check out You Only
<v Speaker 2>Live Nine Times and hey also Homer's Odyssey, both written
<v Speaker 2>by New York Times bestselling author Gwen Cooper. You can
<v Speaker 2>buy her books at shop dot Gwen Cooper dot com
<v Speaker 2>and also I'm sure wherever books are sold. Again, thank
<v Speaker 2>you Gwen for coming on Catitude. I want to thank
<v Speaker 2>everyone that listens to Catitude. I appreciate you so much
<v Speaker 2>over the years. This has been an amazing ride that
<v Speaker 2>is hopefully going to continue for many more years. Thanks
<v Speaker 2>to my cat crew Dennis, Charlotte and Molly who talks
<v Speaker 2>among themselves all the time, I know it, And of
<v Speaker 2>course a huge thank you to my producer Mark Winter
<v Speaker 2>for doing all you do and making our shows on
<v Speaker 2>pet Life Radio sound amazing. And hey, remember lose the Attitude,
<v Speaker 2>have Catitude
<v Speaker 4>Let's Talk Pets every week on demand only on Petlifradio
<v Speaker 4>dot com.