Many strong minded women have headstrong daughters. But this isn't supposed to extend to their cats...

Some say your previous cat chooses their successor. If so, what in cat heaven's name was Helen Brown's beloved Cleo thinking when she sent a crazy kitten like Jonah?

When Cleo died, Helen Brown swore she'd never get another kitten. But after she was diagnosed with breast cancer an unscheduled visit to a pet shop resulted in the explosive arrival of a feisty kitten called Jonah. Like Cleo, Jonah possessed great energy and charm. But unlike Cleo, he often morphed into a highly strung and capricious escape artist. Still, as Helen recovered from a mastectomy, he also proved to be a healer in his own right.

While struggling to deal with her own mortality, Helen helped arrange her son Rob's wedding, completed her international best seller, Cleo, and was confronted with her eldest daughter Lydia's determination to abandon university studies to embark on a spiritual life. Lydia's desire to become a Buddhist nun in war-torn Sri Lanka was matched only by Jonah's yearning to be an outdoor cat in a decidedly indoor-cat neighbourhood...

After Cleo is a warm, wise and often funny account of the highs and lows of mother-daughter relationships, the impact of a potentially life-threatening illness, and an often kooky - some might say deranged - cat called Jonah.