June 2020 – My Cat Jeoffry Bookstore and Cat Lounge

Our Bookshop Store is Up!

By TJ June 9, 2020Books, Bookstore Updates

We finally have our Bookshop store up! It's a work in progress, and I'm constantly adding new books I find or remember, but it's finally up and running. If you like print books, please consider buying through our page there. All proceeds go back to the organization since we…

Irina the Belgian Marshmallow

By TJ June 9, 2020Books, Dog Adoption, Dogs, Fiction, Personal, Romance

Well, 2019 ended up being crazy busy but hugely productive for me. After Rhea passed away at the end of 2018 I fell into a bad depression. She'd been with me for so much of my adult life, from New York to California to Arizona, and losing her hit…

MY GENTLE BARN: CREATING A SANCTUARY WHERE ANIMALS HEAL AND CHILDREN LEARN TO HOPE By Ellie Laks

By TJ June 9, 2020Animal Sanctuaries, Books, Farm Animals, Memoir, Nonfiction

This book came out a few years ago but I just listened to the audio version and have to make readers aware of it if you are not already! It's a memoir, by Gentle Barn founder Ellie Laks, detailing her long journey to forming this wonderful sanctuary, which both…

HOW TO BE A GOOD CREATURE by Sy Montgomery

By TJ June 9, 2020Arachnids, Books, Dogs, Farm Animals, Marine Animals, Memoir, Nonfiction, Wild Animals

Love, love, love this book! It's an essential addition to any animal lover's book collection! Naturalist Sy Montgomery is one of my favorite nonfiction writers, and this wonderful memoir is a collection of homages to animals she's loved throughout her life - both those she's lived with as family,…

THE FRIEND by Sigrid Nunez

By TJ June 9, 2020Books, Dogs, Fiction

I recently listened to the audio book version of this novel, after it won the 2018 National Book Award for fiction. It was billed as a book about a woman mourning the loss of her friend to suicide by caring for his Great Dane, whom she inherits. I often…

Sofia and Rhea

By TJ June 9, 2020Cats, Personal, Pet Illness

"Mom," Sofia says to me. "I sense Rhea out back. All the times you wouldn't let her out because you were scared she would get hurt by the owls and coyotes and fast cars on the nearby freeway, and she wanted to go out so badly. Well, now she…

Cruel Candy: A Cozy Corgi Mystery, Book 1

By TJ June 9, 2020Books, Dogs, Fiction

We received a recommendation of this book from Amazon, who seemed to know just what we needed right now: a cute cozy mystery featuring an endearing animal co-sleuth :) Cruel Candy is the first of many books in Mildred Abbott's Cozy Corgi series. Main character, 38-year-old Fred (short for…

Sweet Rhea

By TJ June 9, 2020Cats, Personal, Pet Illness

This post was originally posted December 25, 2018 here. Rhea passed away from her cancer November 29, almost a month ago now, and I've been quite heartbroken. She moved cross-country with me, and lived with me in five different apartments, and finally a house. She'd been with me through…

Update on Rhea

By TJ June 9, 2020Cats, Personal, Pet Illness

I last wrote about Rhea's experience with stereotactic radiosurgery about two weeks after she had finished treatment. She was doing well then, which of course thrilled me because I had no idea what to expect. It's now been a little over two months. A couple of days after we…

LOUISIANA’S WAY HOME by Kate DiCamillo

By TJ June 9, 2020Books, Fiction, Middle-Grade

Lovely book we discovered the other day at the Chandler Public Library. LOUISIANA'S WAY HOME by one of our favorite middle-grade authors, Kate DiCamillo, tells the story of Louisiana Elefante, a young girl whose parents have died and who is living with her grandmother. One day, her granny insists…