The travelling cat chronicles

About

Nana is a proud, opinionated stray cat with a crooked tail shaped like the number seven — which is how he got his name. After being hit by a car, he is rescued by Satoru, a gentle young man who becomes the only human Nana has ever trusted. When Satoru can no longer keep him, they set off on a road trip across Japan, visiting old friends one by one, each a potential new home for Nana. None of them works out — and the reason, when it finally comes, reframes everything that came before. Arikawa tells the story partly through Nana’s narration, which is funny, vain, and unexpectedly moving: a cat’s-eye view of human kindness and human fragility. The novel is sentimental in the best sense — it earns every feeling it asks for. What lingers is not the sadness but the loyalty: the quiet, stubborn devotion of two creatures who chose each other.