FREE: The Cat Who Could Read Backwards, by Lilian Jackson Braun

The listing, The Cat Who Could Read Backwards, by Lilian Jackson Braun has ended.

Paperback, Very Good condition
5.0 out of 5 stars: Welcome to the World of The Cat Who....,
Amazon Review By Customer "lnsoutherner" 2/17/2003
This is the first of a series of 25 The Cat Who murder mysteries. Published in 1966, it was also one of professional newspaper woman's Lilian Braun's first attempts into the world of the novel.
I read several of her later works first, so it was odd, for me, to read her first work, in which the conversations and situations were more forced and the story line a little more convoluted. It was also fun, because, in spite of the less practiced writing techniques, it was still a great story with wonderful characters.
The book opens with an introduction to Jim Qwilleran, who is a full and complex character right from the start. He is a recovering alcoholic who isn't maudlin about it, a veteran newsman who needs to recover his once prize-winning reputation, a middleaged bachelor with an ex-wife across the country and a hopeful interest in possible girlfriends. He takes a job he doesn't want because he needs to pay bills. The job is covering the art beat for the newspaper, instead of the crime beat he covets.... and, fortunately, for him, the murders just happen to occur on the art beat for the rest of this story. By the end he has adopted the very interesting Saimese, Koko, who will, with Qwill, star in the next 24 The Cat Who mysteries....
These fun stories are greatly entertaining without insulting your intelligence. Kind of like the great anti-television.