I was just going through our blog and can hardly believe I haven't conducted an interview since July! Boy, do I feel like a slacker! That all changes today because I'm chatting with the kitty crew (led by the lovely Little) from Mollie Hunt's Crazy Cat Lady cozy mystery series. I hope you enjoy meeting them and check out their books!
Little: Hi, Mudpie. I’m Little. I’ve designated myself official spokes-kitty for today’s interview. Since there are so many of us, to do it any other way would be a cat-tastrophe! As you may have heard, our cohabitor Lynley Cannon is a cat shelter volunteer, so she’s always finding kitties in need. She also fosters cats, and every once in a while, she doesn’t want to give them back. That’s how I ended up with her, in fact. Some people call it a “foster failure,” but Lynley calls it a foster success!
Let me introduce the rest of us.
Dirty Harry, the big tuxedo boy, has been with Lynley the longest, and now he’s getting on in years now. He was a stray who wouldn’t leave, and we all love him dearly.
Violet arrived from a needy friend. She’s the fat one— oh, I’m not supposed to call her fat, am I? But what else can you say about a cat who looks like a gray velvet beach ball?
Solo came not long after, white with one green eye and one blue eye and totally deaf. She is shy and lives under the couch.
Big Red, another porch stray, is also on the shy side, but I don’t know why, since he’s a huge red tabby who shouldn’t be scared of anything. Maybe it’s something from his past. He doesn’t like to talk about it.
Lynley adopted
Tinkerbelle from Friends of Felines cat shelter. She’s the oldest of all of us, all black and floofy. Lynley calls her a therapy cat and takes her to visit people in catless places like hospitals.
Emilio is black too, but twice the size of Tinkerbelle. He came from the Cloverleaf Animal Sanctuary in the San Juan Islands when Lynley went for an art retreat there. Tink, Emilio, and I are Lynley’s Beauteous Black Cat Club.
Mab is the only breed cat in our clowder. She’s a lilac point Siamese who Lynley rescued from a nefarious breeder. She’s still little more than a kitten, and acts accordingly.
I hope you can remember all that, Mudpie. Don’t tell anyone, but I think we may be getting another sister at the end of
Cat Café. Solo is in for a bit of a change in this book, too.
What is a typical day like at your house?
Little: Well, obviously the first thing we must do is wake up our cohabitor and get her to feed us breakfast. Feeding time can be quite a chore at our house, because some of us are on special diets and medication. Big Red has IBD. Yuck! But he takes pills so he’s normal unless he eats something other than his prescription food. Unfortunately he likes our food better, so Lynley has to feed him in a place of his own.
Lynley plays with us every morning and evening. We have more toys than we know what to do with, but we love to torment her by snubbing the toys and playing with bits of paper or string instead. We like to help her clean the house by jumping in the bed when she’s making it and lying on her papers when she wants to straighten up. It’s all fun and games until the vacuum comes out!
All of us are indoor cats, but a few years ago, Lynley had her back yard completely cat-fenced, so now we get to go outside. I personally love to go out, but some of the others, not so much. Harry used to be quite the gallivanter in his day, but now he’d rather lie in his window bed and watch.
Most days, Lynley goes to Friends of Felines to volunteer. I don’t know why she needs to care for other cats when she has all of us, but she’s just nice like that. We don’t usually mind because she goes during the day while we’re all at nap.
She does other things that have nothing to do with us. She likes to listen to hip hop and take walks with the senior ladies. She spends a lot of time on her computer, looking up her Scottish ancestors. I know there must be a Scottish Fold in her background somewhere. I hear from our fellow cat character Joe Grey of
Shirley Rousseau Murphy’s Joe Grey mysteries that the Celtic cats are magic. I’m sure she has inherited a little magic from them.
Do you all tend to get along or is there any kitty drama going on?
Little: Oh, we all get along, some more than others. Mab the Siamese kitten and big Violet are unlikely playmates. Big Red is a bit of a loner, though he’ll snuggle with Tinkerbelle sometimes when she’s asleep. Solo is the only one who doesn’t really seem to like us much, but she’s scared of everyone but Lynley, and now Lynley’s granddaughter Seleia. (More on that soon!) Our author is a cozy writer so there’s always a happy ending.
Tell us about the Crazy Cat Lady cozy mystery series you all star in.
Little: Our author says it “features Lynley Cannon, a sixty-something cat shelter volunteer who finds more trouble than a cat in catnip,” but really it features us, as well as other guest cats who happen to drop by. It makes perfect sense that the real heroes should be cats, because these are cozy cat mysteries. One of our reviewers wrote:
“I knew this novel was about cats but it's theme is cats! Cats are as much the main characters as the main character is!” Needless to say, we all play our parts wonderfully. Here is a little more about the books themselves:
Cats’ Eyes, #1:
Look what the cat dragged in! When Lynley’s old kitty Fluffo discovers a stolen uncut diamond, Lynley finds herself accused of murdering the thieves.
Copy Cats, #2:
When Lynley exposes a breed cat counterfeiting ring, she becomes the target of a serial killer who murders with a grisly cat-like claw.
Cat’s Paw, #3:
Two suspicious deaths at an elite art retreat send Lynley running back to Portland, but murder follows in her wake.
Cat Call, #4:
Lynley takes over as cat handler for a TV pilot only to find the show is hexed and murder is waiting in the wings.
Cat Café, #5:
A body is discovered on the floor of the cat café, and all the black cats are missing!
(Books need not be read in order.)
How on earth does a retired cat lady get into so much trouble?
Little: Lynley doesn’t look for trouble, but I suppose that because she’s retired, she has even more time for trouble to find her. She’s won a reputation as an amateur sleuth among the Portland Police, and having a best friend who is a humane investigator (animal cop) exposes her to a certain criminal element.
Lynley’s learned a lot from feline-kind; she has a cat-curious minds, and isn’t afraid to leap into situations that would scare people of lesser character, though I must admit that sometimes she doesn’t think things through and gets in over her head.
Do any of you have special abilities that assist her in solving the mysteries she stumbles upon, or do you prefer to just provide kitty comfort when things get crazy?
Little: We are just normal housecats, and by normal, of course I mean smart, savvy, intuitive, telepathic, beautiful… you get the idea. We don’t speak human or anything like that, though Lynley usually has no difficulty understanding us when we want her to. One or the other of us has been known to step in and save the day on several occasions.
Can you give us any clues as to what's coming up next for you guys?
Little: Lynley’s next adventure begins at the local comic-con, where she is helping a friend sell her cute costumes for cats. (
Cosmic Cat, coming in 2019) When a superhero cosplayer falls to his death right in front of her booth, Lynley is left holding the bag— and a cat! If you like superheroes and cosplay, you’ll enjoy this story. Lynley dresses in costume, and not a cat costume either!
Shortly after that, our author is bringing out a Christmas novella (
Cat Noel, 2019). No one gets murdered in this one, thank Cat, but there’s lots of action as Lynley tries to help find a catnapped wiccan familiar and ends up… you guessed it… in trouble, herself.
No rest for poor Lynley, because her new year takes off with a Cat Summit on the Long Beach Peninsula. (
Cat Conundrum, 2020) A rash of locked-room murders has the local sheriff in a tizzy. The only clue is a cat, and he’s not talking.
Well, Mudpie, it’s been fun, but we really have to get back to our routine now. Places to go, people to jump on… you know the drill. Thanks for having us, and I hope all your readers will be inspired to find out more about us in
Cat Café and our author’s other
Crazy Cat Lady cozy mysteries. Ta ta!
Continue the
Cat Café Book Launch Blog Hop tomorrow,
Oct 31, with:
Native Oregonian Mollie Hunt has always had an affinity for cats, so it was a short step for her to become a cat writer. Mollie is the author of THE CRAZY CAT LADY COZY MYSTERY SERIES, featuring Portland native Lynley Cannon, a sixty-something cat shelter volunteer who finds more trouble than a cat in catnip. The 3rd in the series, CAT’S PAW, was a finalist for the 2016 Mystery & Mayhem Book Award. Mollie also published a non-cat mystery, PLACID RIVER RUNS DEEP, which delves into murder, obsession, and the challenge of chronic illness in bucolic southwest Washington. Two of her short cat stories have been published in anthologies, one of which, THE DREAM SPINNER, won the prestigious CWA Muse Medallion this year.
