The Cats of Circlet Press

by Bethany Zaiatz

We had a recent spate of editorial correspondence in which authors mentioned their cats. The cats were always HELPING to get the writing done, of course…

So we thought it would be fun to ask our authors for pictures of their cats to post here in the blog. Because, why not? The Internet is for Cat Pictures. (Well, and porn, but we already do that…!) So here goes…

Ann Monrow’s cat Daisy
Ann says of Daisy, “She was adopted by my son and I when a neighborhood boy brought him over, let us both fall in love with her, then promptly replied with “I can’t take her home! We have 5 more and my mom hates cats.” Daisy has grown remarkably well in the last 4 months and has a favorite pastime of behaving like a little freak on speed, zipping from the hallway, up to the rocking chair, to the couch, to the back of the computer chair, to the tv stand, and back out to the hall before I can look around at the flash of air that just passed my head.”

Andrea Dale’s cats Grimoire and Eostre
Andrea tells us, “Eostre, the smaller white cat, was a stray with a broken leg who adopted us when we lived in Wales. Since she showed up on a rainy Easter evening, her name was a given (Eostre was the Anglo Saxon goddess of the spring, and where the word “Easter” comes from). Grimoire, the larger orange-and-white cat, is one of her kittens. Did I mention that through several surgeries, nobody noticed she was pregnant?”

Catherine Lundoff’s cat Inanna
Catherine says in this photo Inanna was “making a serious effort to get us to consider taking her to Gaylaxicon 2008. She’s already got her ‘lingerie’ packed. “

Cecilia Tan’s cats Renki and Tai Gau
The official office mascots of Circlet Press, Renki and Tai Gau would surely take over the entire operation with their cuteness if they weren’t so busy maintaining their respective territories in a kitty civil war.

Deb Atwood’s cat Caramel
Deb says of Caramel, “Over the summer we were adopted by a stray cat. My family and I were in the pool when we heard someone mewing pitifully, and so as he walked out from the trees, we were all standing at the edge staring at him. Little did we know that as we stared, recognition occurred, and from that moment forward he was living first on our back porch, then in our home. He showed his devotion by bringing us presents less than an hour after we met.”

Diane Kepler’s cat Grim
Diane says of Grim, “As you can see, his style is pretty monochrome. Grim arrived in my life care of a gentleman who worked as a parking attendant and took care of stray cats in his spare time. He was this gruff-looking Russian immigrant, with thick fingers and an even thicker accent, but he crooned at the kitties as if they were infants. He asked what I did for a living and scowled when I mentioned being a student at the local university. He looked at me severely and, with his limited English, made it clear that under no circumstances was this 10-week old bundle of black cuddliness to be used in any experiments.”

Erastes’ cats Lili la Pinke, Lucius, and Severus
Erastes says of the furry trio, “Lili is noisy to the point of distraction and chats constantly. Lucius is a wanderer. I got him and his brother (Severus, the last picture) together when they were named Piglet and Popp (yuk) and they settled in well. However after a year, Lucius one day disappeared for a day, then came back. A week or two later he disappeared for 3 days – then came back. Then it was a week, then a month – coming back for a week or so each time. Last time he was gone THREE months and then just wandered in again and took up the routine as if nothing had happened. Wanderers can’t be cured, so I just let him get on with it – Severus doesn’t seem to miss him! Severus is a darling – more like a dog than a cat, gets soaking wet and then launches himself into my arms to dry off, follows me out walking and is just what I need – what with Lucius being absent and Lili not allowing cuddles!”

Eric Del Carlo’s cat Voo Doo
When asked for comment on his cat, Eric replied, “Voodoo. Stalwart Katrina refugee. ‘Nuff said.” Be sure to look for Eric Del Carlo’s new novel The Bleed, an erotic cross-dimensional romp, coming out through Loose Id.

I.G. Frederick’s cats Rita and Zola
Frederick says, “The first one is Zola, aka Ms. Princess. She’s a camera slut. Last fall when the boy I owned at the time was in school, we were on opposite schedules. I went to bed long after he did and he was in school long before I woke. One night I came up to find Zola in his school bag with an “Aren’t I cute, take my picture look.” I had to agree, so I did. The boy called me on his lunch to let me know that Zola had gotten him to take the cutest picture of her when he got up in the morning. Yup, same one. This is the cat (second picture) who when I bought her a new bed to replace the paper box with a blanket in it) refused to sleep in it. UNTIL one day I put her in the basket and took her picture. She’s been sleeping in it ever since. Now, Rita (picture three) is actually a dog in cat’s clothing. She’s also my techno cat. Loves to watch the pages come out of the printer. Back when I had a land line, she knew the difference between the fax and the phone and would come running to watch the fax come in. The girls have a water fountain with a reservoir. Rita figured out that if she drinks enough, she gets bubbles. She’ll drink, check for bubbles, drink some more, and check until she can get the bubbles to watch.”

Jason Rubis’ friend’s cat Minerva
Jason explains, “She’s not actually my cat – she belongs to my best friend Holly – but I helped bring them together. And she’s such a beautiful manx that I couldn’t resist submitting her (with Holly’s permission, naturally!) Holly collects Barbies, and was delighted to find a “doll” version of Minerva (sort of) at a thrift store one day. So this is Minerva holding her “Minerva Barbie.” Be sure to look for Jason’s work in Circlet’s upcoming Like A Sword and Like Crimson Droplets anthologies.

J. Blackmore’s cats Claire and Beru
Blackmore tells us, “Claire is sixteen, deaf, and pure evil. All this, in cat form, equals joy. From her mutated meow, to her tendency to attack inanimate objects at night, she is utterly unique and is treasured accordingly. She wouldn’t have it any other way. Beru is the red ninja. She has been known to scale curtains, sheer walls, and medium-sized dogs. When not defying gravity, she may be found loudly complaining about her lack of canned food, or shamelessly begging to be massaged.”

Jean Roberta’s cat Ista
Ista is one of two cats described by Jean as being “very fluffy, very spoiled, conceited Himalayans.”

Lynne Jamneck’s cats Jasper and Stella
Lynne says of Stella and Jasper, “Stella likes to transmission secrets about humanity to the cat mothership somewhere… up there… Jasper’s a big old mama’s boy who loves his homemade wool pompoms. We love the little buggers.”

Rob Hill’s cat Pretzel
Rob says, “Here’s a ferocious fuzzface named Pretzel, who is sadly no longer among us. During his all-too-brief tenure he soiled many a rug, drank from many a toilet, and napped in many a sunbeam.”

Stephen Dedman’s cat Grey
Stephen tells us Grey is “re-enacting a famous Gary Larson cartoon (okay, I put the sign up after she crawled into the clothes-dryer, but she did that of her own free will).”

Regis’ cats Vague and Nikita
Vague is the one who has managed to get into Regis’ pants (but not in the way you think!) while Nikita joins her sibling for a snapshot with a cordless drill. We’re not going to ask about that.

By the way, if anyone would like to make LOLCATS out of these and submit them back to us for a future post… please email your macro’d versions to us at the Gmail address: “circletintern”.

This entry was posted on Thursday, October 30th, 2008 at 4:06 pm and is filed under Writers On Writing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.