Though much is made about the no-novel years of Lilian Braun between her first three books and the rest of the “Cat Who…” series, it is the sheer genius of the woman that merits attention. At ninety-two years of age, she is an inspiration for any writer, young or old.
Braun takes some of the world’s most common ingredients and stirs them into one of the most engaging mystery series of our time. Jim Qwilleran, leading man in her single series seems a mix of her parents. Her mother was a consummate story teller and encouraged her children to tell their own stories. Dad was an inventor. So, her mother’s ability to listen while others talked became one of Qwilleran’s most engaging personality traits. While the inventiveness of her father comes out in everything from the recreation of an apple barn into a home to the ability of Koko and YumYum to communicate non-cat-like information to, Qwilleran, their keeper.
Although she did start the series at a much younger age – a youthful fifty – she was apparently too occupied for nearly three decades as editor of the “Good Living” section of the Detroit Free Press to have time for other writing. She moved to Tyron, a small town in North Carolina which has seen many other artists in residence over the last hundred years or so. Georgia poet Sidney Lanier, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Margaret Culkin Banning, Payne Erskine and playwright William Gillette to name a few, all have history in this amazing town. So, perhaps the ambiance of the town re-sparked her novelistic instincts.
She obviously found her muse and has written over twenty more books in the Cat series. Yes, Braun does have her own cats, though she claims they have no psychic abilities.
