It’s time to look at the books I read in March! I received an advanced copy of both of these books to review. These are my own words and my own opinions.
Cat’s People by Tanya Guerrero
★★★★★
Available to purchase/download on April 1, 2025
I loved this book!
A stray cat named “Cat” and 5 strangers come together over a summer in this novel about love, family, and connection.
Núria is a single-by-choice barista and member of the Meow-Yorkers, a group that takes care of the neighborhood stray cats. Collin is a best-selling author, self-professed hermit, and lover of coffee. Lily is a Georgia native who is fresh out of high school and has moved to New York to find her long-lost sister. Omar is the beloved neighborhood mailman. Bong is a grieving widower who owns the neighborhood bodega. “Cat” is a curious and observant stray black cat.
While volunteering one day, Núria starts finding Post-It notes left by an admirer at the place where she feeds her favorite stray, “Cat”. She responds and the notes continue back and forth, with a little more information given in each answer. Are they from Collin, Lily, Omar, or Bong? Of course, “Cat” knows who is leaving them.
When “Cat” falls ill, the five strangers bond together, and the desire to save him creates chance encounters that lead to love, friendship, and family.
The Library of Lost Dollhouses by Elise Hooper
★★★★.5
Available to purchase/download on April 1, 2025
Tlidy, a young librarian in a beautiful historic library in present-day San Francisco, enjoys her job as head curator. She works to meticulously preserve the century’s worth of artifacts housed within the library. The order of the books, the calm and quietness, and the pieces of art are part of what she loves most.
Her world is soon turned upside down when she, for one, learns that the library is about to go into bankruptcy, and two, she discovers two beautifully crafted dollhouses in a hidden storage area on an upper floor of the library. These two dollhouses have special, yet tiny details, that Tildy soon discovers tell stories about the people for whom these dollhouses were built. After this discovery, she sets out to find out more about the history of the dollhouses and soon discovers that there are more than just the two.
In her quest to discover the history of the dollhouses, and to help save her beloved library, Tildy is led through pre-WWI Paris, to post-WWI and WW2 in the English countryside, to Walt Disney’s studio in Burbank, California. Who was this dollhouse creator, what stories were they trying to tell/secrets were they trying to hide, and what did this have to do with her mother?
If you like historical fiction, libraries, books, dollhouses, mysteries, or all of the above, this book is for you!
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