Cleo: How a Small Black Cat Helped Heal a Family - Hardcover

Helen Brown was born and brought up in New Zealand where she worked as a journalist, TV presenter and scriptwriter. Now living in Melbourne, Australia with her family, Helen continues to write columns for the New Zealand media, where she's been voted Columnist of the Year several times. Website: www.helenbrown.com.au

Grace can come in deceptively small packages. For Brown, it arrived in the form of a runt-of-the-litter kitten whom her two young sons, Sam and Rob, adored on sight. Promised as an upcoming present for Sam’s tenth birthday, it was a gift the boy never received. While the kitten was being weaned from its mother, Sam was taken from his. Just weeks after his birthday, Sam was killed in an auto accident, and Brown’s world changed forever. Yet when the kitten was delivered to her new home right on schedule, Brown’s heart first broke with the unfairness of it all, then gradually began to mend as little Cleo did what all kittens do: mounted a charm offensive like no other. Over the next 23 years, as Brown’s marriage ended and career blossomed, the spunky Cleo remained her constant source of comfort and inspiration. Heartfelt and open, Brown’s buoyant tale of loss and recovery celebrates the resilient patience and restorative powers of animal compassion. --Carol Haggas