Coffee Table Book of: Cats (Paperback)

Description

Coffee Table Book of: Cats is a large format book of cats, printed edge to edge in colour, one picture to a page and the widest carried across two: tabbies, tortoiseshells, calicos and gingers, long haired and short haired breeds, kittens from their first days, eyes, ears, whiskers and paws seen close, and the meadows, gardens, barns and harbours where cats live, at many hours and in every season.

Coats of many kinds appear: a brown tabby on a worn garden step with the dark M on its brow, a classic tabby in broad swirls along an old stone wall, a tortoiseshell among red poppies, a calico among ferns, a black and white cat on a gatepost, a ginger tabby in golden stubble, a pure white cat with blue eyes, a silver tabby beside the lavender, a blue cream washing its face in the sun and a dilute calico in purple heather.

Kittens are seen from their first days: two newborns asleep on straw with their eyes still sealed, a mother nursing in the hay, a small face with cloudy blue eyes, a ginger kitten clinging to an old trunk, a tabby kitten leaping over meadow grass, another batting a ball of red wool and two at play on a summer lawn.

Seen close are a green eye with its pupil closed to a slit, white whiskers fanned forward, an ear turned to a sound, a pink nose, a soft black paw and the golden eyes of a black cat. The places stand empty at dawn, noon, dusk and night, in mist, frost, rain and snow: a sunny windowsill, a barn of golden hay, a clump of flowering catnip, a bluebell wood, a cottage garden at noon, a snowy field under the stars and a line of paw prints across a winter garden.

Short notes run through the book, on how coats and colours are inherited, how kittens grow, and how cats see, hear, hunt and rest: a classic tabby wears broad swirls on its flanks, often round a dark spot like a target, the gene for a pure white coat is linked to blue eyes and to deafness, so some white cats cannot hear, every kitten’s eyes are blue when they first open, and their lasting colour shows weeks later, and a cat’s print shows four toe pads and no claw marks, since its claws stay drawn in while it walks.

Printed in full colour on heavy 150gsm coated paper at 216 x 279 mm (8.5 x 11 inches), as a paperback.