Kitten - by Stacey Yu (Hardcover)

Book Synopsis

Katie is far from home and fresh out of college, desperate to skirt adulthood's demands, and all too willing to let her wealthy boyfriend James make decisions for them both. It doesn't help that she's no longer speaking to her mother, who resents her for leaving Little Rock. Or that her roommate has abruptly moved out of their New York City apartment. But when James takes Katie on vacation to his family's seaside house, he brings Silver, his childhood cat, and Katie discovers a sudden, strange, and giddy sense of connection.

Silver doesn't mind that Katie can't seem to get a job, hold her own at dinner parties, or make amends with her mother. Silver, who gets to lie around all day, misbehave spectacularly, be cute, gross, and still get fed, seems to have the life Katie increasingly longs for. Soon enough, they're inseparable, and something inside Katie begins to crack open, or maybe just...crack.

Because if Katie has learned anything from her estranged mother, it's that devotion comes at a price. As Katie's affection for Silver deepens, all of her other relationships begin to falter. Soon, Katie must confront what it is she desires from her life, and what she might have to risk to get it.

Both darkly playful and unexpectedly heartfelt, this debut from a major new voice in fiction is a timeless reckoning with the uncertainty of becoming a person in a world that is as disorienting as it is full of hope and promise.

Review Quotes

"A fresh, funny, and totally bewitching love story that asks profound questions about attachment and how to belong to one another and to ourselves . . . Kitten will wind its way around your heart."--Gina Chung, author of Sea Change

"Even the most loyal dog person will be charmed by Yu's hilarious, wry, and moving novel about the pleasure and pain of realizing you can be and do whatever you want."--Jean Kyoung Frazier, author of Pizza Girl

"Soft and sharp, totally in control, utterly deranged . . . I lapped it up."--Kiran Millwood Hargrave, author of The Mercies

"Strange, playful, and intimate . . . I didn't want it to end."--Lucy Rose, author of The Lamb

"Exquisitely constructed . . . I was completely unable to resist reading it in one sitting."--Jennifer Croft, author of The Extinction of Irena Rey

"The moment you've finished this spellbinding story, it will play on your mind for days."--Ore Agbaje-Williams, author of The Three of Us

"As tender and brutal as a kiss to the most wounded part of yourself . . . Yu's eye for friction and chaos should be studied."--Ruth Madievsky, author of All-Night Pharmacy

"Enigmatic and entrancing, like burying your nose in the plume of a cat's neck."--Celina Baljeet Basra, author of Happy

"An endearing meditation . . . Kitten will leave you aching."--Alice Evelyn Yang, author of A Beast Slinks Towards Beijing

"Yu's novel is both a kind of Gen Z parable of existential nihilism and a psychologically deft portrait of mother-daughter trauma. . . . The story shines with sharp intelligence. Weird lit girl is having a moment, but this spiky debut refuses to be boxed in." --Kirkus Reviews

"A weird book (that's a compliment)."--Booklist

About the Author