Book Talk on Cleo: The Cat who Mended a Family (2009) by Helen Brown

Outline

            On January 21, 1983, tragedy struck.  Author Helen Brown’s nine-year-old son Sam was hit by a car in front of the family home.  He died, and his six-year-old brother Rob witnessed the accident.  Rob struggled with what he saw.  The family was already unsteady but became more so after Sam’s death.

            Cleo: The cat who mended a family is a memoir that detailed how a tiny kitten could help a family recover from a personal tragedy.  The book wasn’t meant to help them forget Sam, just shift their focus to daily life which included caring for Cleo.  Kittens’ antics are fun and entertaining, and Cleo’s endearing ways helped the family through a sorrowful time. 

Rob was a complex child and could see how their kitty could help the family.  He told his mother that Cleo had told him that she “comes from a long line of cat healers” (Brown, 2009, p. 74).  For 24 years, Cleo continued her good works with the Brown family.

Biography

            Helen Brown was born and raised in New Zealand.  She studied as a journalist and wrote regular columns about her life.  Brown also worked as a scriptwriter, and she won awards for her writing.  For example, three years in a row she won Columnist of the Year by the Magazine Publishers Association of New Zealand.

            Brown married while she was still a teenager.  She and her husband had two sons, Sam and Rob.  After divorcing, Brown remarried and had a daughter, Katharine. 

            The month before Sam’s death, Brown had consented to adopt a young kitten, not really wanting to believe that she was a cat person.  Sam named her Cleo who was only a couple weeks old at that time, so she needed to stay with her mother for a while longer.  Cleo joined the family shortly after Sam’s death, and the Brown family desperately needed her playfulness and companionship as well as the distraction to deal with their grief over Sam’s death.   According to Brown’s website, “Cleo helped the shattered family take the first steps toward healing” (para. 3).  Through Sam’s death, Cleo helped the Brown family learn valuable lessons about what is important in life.

            Brown’s other books include Parenting for dummies (2006) and Cats and daughters: They don’t always come when called (2013), and After Cleo came Jonah (2013). 

                                                                                                  

Rationale

Stories about animals can evoke emotions or ideas that might otherwise stay buried.

Dr. Kenneth Doka is an expert on death and bereavement.  In his book, Grief is a journey: Finding your path through loss, he stated that the “death of a child challenges our sense of a just and predictable world” (p. 126).  Death of an elderly person might be expected, but the loss of a child can be devastating for the survivors.

Feelings of grief and loss can follow the death of a loved one.  When someone we are close to dies, we grieve that person’s absence.  However, loss can take many forms.  We can also feel grief and loss for losing intangible items, such as lost companionship when a relationship ends.  Or the loss of health when illness strikes.  The loss of a job or career.  Or even the loss of freedom while being incarcerated.  Grief and loss might be universal, but perhaps not how we deal with them.  Brown’s book tells of how her family dealt with grief, in hopes of helping her readers through similar experiences.

Teaching Ideas

1.      Students write letters to a person (e.g., family member or friend) or pet that has died.  Another option is for students to write a letter to an ability that has been lost, such as youth or good health.  They could address unresolved issues with the deceased person or lost thing.  They could discuss their feelings about death, listing the many ways they miss the person, pet, or ability.

2.      After watching excerpts of the movie Life is Beautiful (1997), the class has a discussion about how death and grief were portrayed in the film and then compare it with how Brown addressed the same in Cleo.

3.      Ask students to write a list of words that deal with people’s emotions about death.  What are some of the words to describe sorrow?  The class discusses the examples and the emotions they evoke.

Obstacles

            Cleo is written at about an eighth-grade reading level, which might be a challenge for some adult basic readers. 

Some people cannot or will not address their grief.  Grief and loss are very personal and might be difficult to talk about, especially in a classroom setting.  I teach English—I am not a counselor—so opening up the topic of grief can be unnerving, the proverbial can of worms.

References

Braschi, G. & Ferri, E. (Producers), & Benigni, R. (Director). (1997, December 20). Life is Beautiful [Motion picture]. Italy: Cecchi Gori Group.

Brown, H. (2009). Cleo: The cat who mended a family. New York, NY: Kensington Publishing.

Brown, H. (2016). HelenBrown.com. Retrieved from https://www.helenbrown.com.au/about-me/

Doka, K. J. (2016). Grief is a journey: Finding your path through loss. New York, NY: Atria Books.

Lesa. (2010, September 16). Lesa’s book critiques. Retrieved from https://lesasbookcritiques. blogspot.com/2010/09/cleo-cat-who-mended-family-by-helen.html

With eyes open: Teachers guide to grief and understanding different views on death. (2000). Public Broadcasting Service. Retrieved from https://www-tc.pbs.org/witheyesopen/ grief612.PDF