CD and the Giant Cat

Welcome to Sally's book-a-day-for-2017 blog. If unfamiliar with the blog, scroll down.

CD and the Giant Cat (1997) Post 189

CD and the Giant Cat is twenty years old, but it's still a favourite of mine. It all began when my husband and co-writer read out one of those "odd spot" pieces from a newspaper. It opined that feral cats were growing bigger than their domesticated cousins because of selective breeding. At around the same time, my husband said he wished there was a way of pre-selecting songs to put on CDs because so many "best of" collections had duplicates. Then there was the matter of the dingo, which is accepted as an Australian native but which is clearly not--or not precisely, since it is not a marsupial. We put all these things together and came up with a story.

Callista Derry, known as CD, has just left her futuristic school. She has put in for music or animals for her adult job, but has been given an outpost in the desert. Here she mixes music for occasional travellers and generally looks after the place with the help of BOSS, a robot supervisor. We WERE surprised when playlists popped up a few years later!

CD encounters an intelligent giant cat known as the desert feral. The Cat is not welcome by the authorities who want it exterminated because it's a feral cat. CD befriends it and successfully defends it on the dingo precedent. It is markedly different from its ancestors and has developed to fit its environment...

CD is a young teenager who grows and develops her personality and intellect during her tenure at the desert outpost. She takes on the establishment from a sound reasoned and intellectual standpoint... and wins.

CD and the Giant Cat is not the only book that arose from a newspaper clipping. Trinity Street (1998) did also. Striking cover, isn't it?

About the Blog 

Sally is Sally Odgers; author, manuscript assessor, editor, anthologist and reader. She runs http://www.affordablemanuscriptassessments.com and Prints Charming Books. (Sally is me, by the way, and I am lots of other things too, but these are the relevant ones for now.)

The goal for 2017 is to write a post a day profiling the background behind one of my books; how it came to be written, what it's about, and any things of note that happened along the way. If you're an author, an aspiring author, a reader or just someone who enjoys windows into worlds, you might find this fun. The books are not in any special order, but will be assigned approximate dates, and pictures, where they exist. If you enjoyed a post, or want to ask about any of my books or my manuscript assessment service, leave me a message.