CBR 17 BINGO: “B” (for “Blanket”)
On a recent visit to my local library, I was attracted to this book by the adorable illustration on the cover. Reading the book jacket, I learned that The Blanket Cats is a collection of seven stories about a pet shop in Tokyo that rents out cats for three days and two nights. Each cat comes with a special blanket to which they are very attached (do not lose or wash that blanket!). Some customers have practical reasons for wanting a temporary feline–such as the family looking for a doppelgänger for their deceased pet so as not to upset their aged grandmother who is coming for a visit–but most customers in these stories are seeking to experience a little joy or ease a hurt in their lives. The owner of the shop gives every customer the same spiel about the care and feeding of their temporary pet, which brought back memories of the movie Gremlins for me. The similarities end there, though, as “Only the cleverest, best-behaved cats get to be Blanket Cats.”
Charming cat illustration aside, these stories are mainly about the shop’s customers and the circumstances that lead them there. In “The Cat Who Sneezed,” a couple struggling with infertility take in a calico to help fill the void and come to learn a few things about parenting. In “The Cat with No Tail,” a young boy with a difficult family life and a painful secret learns about resiliency through his temporary Manx. (Manx cats are tailless due to a genetic mutation, but there’s a story that says the loss came about when they were the last ones onto Noah’s Ark and scooted in just as the door closed on their tails.) The most amusing story in the collection, “The Cat No One Liked,” has a grumpy landlord renting the same mongrel cat for three days every month to help suss out illegal pets in the building. When the story’s narrator wants his girlfriend and her kitten to move in with him, they hatch a plan to rent the same mongrel and let him get friendly with the new kitten so he won’t narc on them.This story is seemingly lighthearted and funny but packs a wallop at the end.
If you’re looking for more cat-centric stories, “The Cat Who Went on a Journey” may satisfy you. This story is told from the point of view of a tabby who bolts from his original customer (she was breaking rules, so we don’t like her) and follows two young children who are running away from home. Tabby taps into his ancestry and recognizes his role as a guardian: “We traveled for weeks across the ocean. We guarded the travelers on their voyages. We plowed west through the wilderness. We stayed at their sides. We crossed rugged mountains, forded rivers, pushed through sandstorms, watched the dawn rise over lakes.”
The cats in these stories may not be magical, per se. They don’t solve people’s problems for them or right the world, but they give their temporary humans the ability to shift their perspective and see their situations differently.
Blanket Cats isn’t profound literature. The stories are basic and sometimes too sweet, though with lots of heartbreak. Yet in spite of the lack of what one would consider traditionally happy endings, this book felt like a warm blanket to me. As the forlorn father in, “The Cat Dreams Were Made Of,” thinks: “I wish we had something like that, a blanket to soothe us to sleep, wherever we find ourselves.” Books like this are my blanket.
This review is Sybil-approved:
Clever, yes. Best-behaved?