Dewey: A Small Town, a Library and the World's Most Beloved Cat - Hardcover

Myron-vicki

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0340953942 ISBN 13: 9780340953945

Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton, 2009

Synopsis

How many lives can one abandoned kitten touch? This is the heart-warming and unforgettable story of a truly idiosyncratic cat with a strong sense of loyalty and love, and a taste for fast-food. When he was just a few weeks old, Dewey Readmore Books was shoved through the book returns slot of his local library in a sleepy town. Starving, terrified and bruised after being battered by falling books, Dewey curled up into the arms of the library director Vicky. Vicky was a single mother who had escaped a violent husband and was struggling to bring up her little girl Jodi alone. Vicky fell in love with the little bundle of fur in her arms and campaigned to allow Dewey to stay and become the library cat. She didnt know what she was letting herself in for Deweys arrival transformed Vicky and Jodis lives, as well as the staff at the library and eventually the fortunes of an entire town. Dewey was an instant hit with the library regulars and had an amazing instinct to cuddle up close to visitors that were going through a tough time.Vicky tells the incredible story of one severely disabled, wheelchair bound girl that Dewey took a shine to and how he would climb inside her jacket as she giggled hysterically and her eyes, usually almost catatonic, burst into life.He supervised childrens reading groups and ensured no child felt left out by snuggling into the laps of any outsiders. He was a ball of mischievous energy and relished in turning the hitherto quiet and predictable routines of the library upside down. Dewey became the towns number one attraction and he began regularly appearing in the national and international media. Fans from all over the world visited the small town to pay homage to the world's most beloved cat.

About this title

About the Author:

Vicki Myron was born on a farm fifteen miles from Spencer, Iowa. At the age of thirty-four, after a failed marriage, single motherhood, and a stint on welfare, she graduated summa cum laude from Mankato State University and has a masters degree from Emporia State University. She worked at the Spencer Public Library for twenty-five years, the last twenty as director. She lives in Spencer, Iowa.

Bret Witter is a book editor and professional writer. Raised in north Alabama, he currently lives in Louisville, Kentucky, with his wife, two children and his fourteen-year-old cat Kiki. His other cat, Feasor, died four days after the completion of this book.

Review:

An abandoned kitten serves as balm, comic relief and social director to a hard-pressed Midwestern town.

The feline came in through the book drop on a bone-crackingly cold winter's night. The place was the public library of Spencer, Iowa, where the corn grows nine feet high and the earth is so fertile "you would swear the ground is about to push up and tip the sky right out of the picture." But this was in the 1980s, when the farm crisis was in full tilt; lenders had foreclosed on 50 percent of the family farms in northwest Iowa by the end of the decade. Local librarian Myron paints a town in crisis: economically, socially and in terms of the human spirit. She was in crisis too and neatly tucks her own recovery into the larger story of the town's gradual rejuvenation. Named Dewey (after the decimal system), the kitten became the library mascot and a synecdoche: "He never lost his trust, no matter what the circumstances, or his appreciation for life...He was confident." Myron doesn't overplay this metaphor, but works it subtly as she depicts the town's fortunes reviving and shows Dewey playing his role in that revival with composure, social skills, patience and a measure of mischief. In an easeful voice and with an eye for detail, she delineates Spencer: its economic swings, the lay of the land, the Prairie Deco downtown. Dewey is the pivot; he even became a bit of a national celebrity, and the New York Times ran his obit. He was, this loving account demonstrates, the right cat in the right place for Spencer and most certainly for its librarian.

Intimate portrait of a place snugly set within its historical moment, preserved in Myron's understated, well-polished prose.

About this edition

• Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton
• Publication date: 2009
• ISBN 10: 0340953942
• ISBN 13: 9780340953945
• Binding: Hardcover