Bono - Helen Brown

With a bad bout of flu confining me to bed, this was the perfect read when my cough was keeping me and my own cat awake all night (she fled to sleep on the couch to escape my annoying her).  Helen Brown is the author of Cleo, her book about another little cat that came into her life and helped her through the grief of losing her young son, and through many changes in her life. 

In this book, she decides to make a bit of a new change decades on, by escaping life in Melbourne and spending a month in New York. Her editor suggests while she is there that she foster a shelter cat and then write about that experience.  Joined initially by her daughter, they take on the worldwind that is Bono, a highly strung black cat that spends most of his time under the bed at the studio flat they have rented.

What is unexpected for Helen, and maybe for the reader is the deep connection that she finds with this little cat, and anyone that enjoys time with their own cats and dogs should enjoy this light read. 5/5

After Cleo Came Jonah - Helen Brown

After Cleo Came Jonah - Helen Brown (2012)

Helens earlier book was  about how  a little cat called Cleo came into her life, and helped her and her son Rob after the tragic death of her son Sam.  Lots of changes occur in their life, new siblings, new relationships, moving houses and Cleo is their to help them through.

Years later, the family are settled into Melbourne, and Helen and her husband are preparing to empty the nest, when the author is diagnosed with breast cancer, not long after the death of her mother.  With the help of her family, she begins the long recovery after mastectomy surgery,  and is enticed to a local pet shop with her sister after spotting a very cute kitten. 

The little cutie comes home and is named Jonah, and boy is he a character.  I enjoyed this book, its tales of not only a naughty kitten, but of the whole family and I felt drawn into the Brown family adventures.  Reading the book, felt like having a good friend over for a drink, and chatting over the kitchen table.  4/5