Weekend Assignment #306: Karen's Cat Book?

Carly's hosting the Weekend Assignment for the first time, and it's a tricky one!

Weekend Assignment #306: You're A Famous Author, What's The Name Of Your Book?

Sounds easy, right? Oh, but hold on, there is a catch here folks! The book you are famous for writing must be from a genre that you aren't known for. As an example, if you really enjoy writing horror stories, make this assignment about a romance novel or a biography, or anything other then you usually relate to. If you don't dabble in writing very often, no worries, simply come up with a title for your fictional book from the genre you read the least.

Extra Credit: Write the opening paragraph of your best-seller!

Ack! So, since I've written a fair amount of fantasy, science fiction and science fantasy, those are off the table. I've also written lots of non-fiction about Arizona and my dogs, so we can't go there.

But I'm famously allergic to cats, and almost as famously uninterested in cooking. My unlikely bestseller, therefore, is a cookbook for cats. I had a different title for it last night, but then I talked to John and had a better idea. Now the title is:

The Cats' Cookbook:

Fabulous Foods for Felines and Friends

And here, just for the heck of it, is the book cover.

As for the Extra Credit, everything in the opening paragraph below is true:

Introduction

On January 10th, 2010, a cat named Luna was taken to a Tucson animal hospital for surgery. An X-ray two days before had revealed a large tumor pressing on the abdomen. Luna had eaten little for the previous month, and the once-sleek American Longhair was reduced to skin and bones. Nevertheless, her bright eyes and continued energy helped to convince her beleaguered owner to take a chance on surgery to remove the unknown mass. At noon on Wednesday the news came: the veterinarian had removed the cancerous half of Luna's stomach. The prognosis was good, but a new question arose: what could the owner safely feed her?

Luna, two days before cancer surgery.

Yes, Luna is a real cat, just not my cat. (She's not the cat on the book cover, either.) Her owner, S., is living on Social Security disability and could not have afforded the surgery at all were it not for a small loan from a local animal rescue group. She'll probably be paying them back for the next year, but if Luna survives it will have been well worth it. As I wrote about at the time, S. got Luna when her previous cat died shortly before Christmas 2008. To lose Luna 14 months later would be devastating for my friend. It's too soon to be sure, but it seems that the surgery has saved Luna's life, at least for a while.

Be sure to check out Ellipsis for the full scoop on how to play along with this week's Weekend Assignment! Then next week I'll be back to to take my turn as host. Let's give Carly a warm welcome as the Weekend Assignment co-host!

And don't forget our other memes:

The Round Robin Photo Challenges - a new topic every two weeks


and


The Ellipsis Monday Photo Shoot - hosted by Carly, with a new topic every Monday!

Karen