11 Bookish Cats Recommend Their Favourite Reads

Book*hug’s resident cat, Tess, lounges with two of the press’s recently-published books: No Credit River by Zoe Whittall and Sugaring Off by Fanny Britt, translated by Susan Ouriou. Tess calls these fur-midable reads to curl up with this winter.

Lola curls up with Barbara Black’s Little Fortified Stories (Caitlin Press), a collection of micro and flash fictions with strange characters in stranger worlds. Two paws up!

Lily wants you to know this translation of Heaven and Hell by Jón Kalman Stefánsson (translated by Philip Roughton) is one heck of a book. A moving and poetic story that celebrates the redemptive power of friendship.

Everest thinks The Dark King Swallows the World (Radiant Press) is the purr-fect January read. A coming-of-age, historical fiction, and fantasy novel that is engaging and emotional.

Hank wants you to know he enjoyed Hanna Stoltenberg’s Near Distance, translated by Wendy H. Gabrielsen (Biblioasis), is a closely observed character study about lonlieness centred on a complex mother-daughter relationship — a powerful, not-to-be-missed debut.

Peppermint agrees with The Miramichi Reader: The Years Shall Run Like Rabbits by Ben Berman Ghan (Wolsak & Wynn) is a “technicolour acid trip” and a highly imaginative work of literary speculative fiction.

Cinnamon cozies up with Satellite Image by Michelle Berry (Wolsak & Wynn), a gripping literary thriller about a couple’s dream move to a quiet small town unravelling into a nightmare, sparked by a chilling satellite discovery, bizarre neighbours, and a house with a haunting past.

Balto is puuur-oud of his human Sarah Ens, the author of the poetry collection Flyway (Turnstone Press), which won the ReLit Award for Poetry in 2023. This is a deeply personal long poem about migration and legacy and their resonance in a modern world.

Zsubi dreams of summertime reading with some favourite books published by Mawenzi House, including West of West Indian by linzey corridon; Nila the Bleeding Garden by Laila Re; Mattress Makers by Sasenarine Persaud; Spiritual Pursuits by Lien Chao; Reimagining ChinaTown: An Anthology of Speculative Fiction, edited by Linda Zhang; Killing Shakespeare by Koom Kankesan.

Thomas Cat (on the left) and Eleanor of Aquitaine (on the right) curl up with an advanced copy of Old Romantics by Maggie Armstrong (Biblioasis), a forthcoming novel “Like Dubliners, if Dubliners were ‘Cat Person’ as a feminist mock-epic about a writer’s coming of age—and every Dubliner was named Margaret.”