Cats & Daughters:: They Don't Always Come When Called - Softcover

Helen Brown was born and brought up in New Zealand, where she first worked as a journalist, TV presenter, and scriptwriter. A multi-award-winning columnist, Helen now lives in Melbourne, Australia, with her family and feline, the internationally beloved Jonah. Her memoir Cleo rose to the top of the bestseller lists in its first weeks in the United States, United Kingdom, New Zealand, France, and Australia, and has been translated into more than sixteen languages. Cats & Daughters further increased her audience with publications in six countries. Tumbledown Manor, her first novel, again shows her storytelling talents. You can visit Helen Brown at www.helenbrown.com and follow her on Facebook.

While working on the manuscript detailing the tragic events surrounding her son’s death and the healing her family found through the love of a special cat (Cleo, 2010), Brown is dealt a devastating one-two punch that sends her fragile world reeling. She is diagnosed with breast cancer, and her eldest daughter announces her desire to move to war-torn Sri Lanka and become a Buddhist nun. Feeling uncertain and needy, Brown struggles with the knowledge that she must let Lydia pursue her own dreams, even though, selfishly, she wants to keep her by her side. Although Lydia returns in time to see Brown through her crisis, her compulsion to follow the Buddhist way will test Brown’s maternal mettle. Once again, it will take a remarkable feline to help her family put things in perspective and impart the kinds of life lessons one can’t always learn from a two-footed guru. Candid, genuine, and unaffected, Brown’s touching memoir celebrates the affirmational power of animal companions to help humans navigate life’s most challenging moments. --Carol Haggas