My beloved monster Masha, the half-wild rescue cat who rescued me

Review by Booklist Review

It's almost inevitable: when we pick up a book about a beloved animal, real or fictional, we know the ending. Documenting his relationship with rescued Siberian Forest cat Masha, Carr (Surrender, New York, 2016) writes with the same intellectual and descriptive rigor his crime fiction and history books are known for. And despite the foregone conclusion and the fact that, like Masha, the author suffers from diseases that may cut his life short, this narrative poem to the intertwined spirits of a companion animal and her human will live on as a love story of the best, most ethereal kind. In snapshots, Masha fights off a bear and fisher; author and cat deal with her arthritis and his neuropathy; Masha explores the woods and steals houseguests' socks. For his part, Carr battles IRS agents, innumerable hospitalizations, and surgery, forges partnerships with Masha's veterinarian and the caretakers who watch over Masha when he can't, and manages, somehow, to continue to write with aplomb and finesse. Tears will flow, and they will be warranted.

From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.

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Review by Publisher's Weekly Review

Novelist Carr (the Kreizler series) delivers a lively and moving memoir about his 17-year companionship with a Siberian forest cat named Masha. Carr first met Masha while visiting a shelter in Vermont. The semi-feral cat was rescued from abandonment in an empty apartment and had developed a reputation among the staff for extreme skittishness. When an employee noticed Masha cozying up to Carr, the attendant implored him to adopt her, and he promptly brought her along to his new home in Upstate New York. Masha quickly took on the dominant role--she hated loud music, so Caleb edited his listening habits to satisfy her--and over the pair's life together, Carr came into his own as a caretaker and a companion. He nursed Masha back to health after attacks from a bear and a pack of dogs, turned a blind eye when she stole visitors' socks, and tended to her arthritis as his own health started to falter and he underwent surgery for peritonitis. Carr alternates the chronicle of his and Masha's relationship with details about his unstable New York City childhood, which was marked by violent outbursts from an alcoholic father and drove him to find comfort in the family cats. Carr's gift for narrative momentum gives shape to the potentially flimsy premise, and he wrings real pathos from this tale of wounded souls finding one another. Even readers without their own furry friend will be moved. Agent: Suzanne Gluck, WME. (Apr.)

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Review by Kirkus Book Review

A Siberian Forest cat spends 17 years with her brilliant, reclusive, deeply unconventional human companion. Within pages of starting this moving book, connoisseurs of fine prose may find themselves gasping with delight, as will cat lovers. Carr, best known for his 1994 novel The Alienist and also a distinguished military historian, reveals that he has always recognized himself to be an "imperfectly reincarnated" feline. When he was 5, he handed his mother a drawing of a boy with the head of a cat and said, "This is me before I was born." You may well be convinced this is true by the end of Carr's amazing tale of commitment, communication, self-discovery, and adventure with his cat, Masha, a half-tame "wildling" who loves the music of Richard Wagner. The author has had a life of exceptional pain and tragedy: His father, the Beat Generation figure Lucien Carr, was given to episodes of physical abuse that resulted in significant emotional and medical consequences. Also, despite Carr's profound bonds with other beloved cats, several came to difficult ends he could not prevent. When he met Masha, who deftly ensured that he would take her home from the overwhelmed Vermont animal shelter where she landed after abuses of her own, he felt his redemption. The two become life partners and were never separated for more than a handful of nights, each of those for hospitalizations caused by Carr's ever more dire physical condition. The story of their life together in the spacious house the author built for himself in Rensselaer County, New York, and in the woods and grounds surrounding it, in all seasons and weather, is a testament to both the human and feline spirits. One of the most powerful and beautiful grief narratives ever written, including all the memoirs about people. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

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