Another Insane Devotion, Peter Trachtenberg
Another Insane Devotion, Peter Trachtenberg
List: $29.98 | Sale: $20.99
Club: $14.99

Another Insane Devotion
On the Love of Cats and Persons

Author: Peter Trachtenberg

Narrator: Joe Geoffrey

Unabridged: 7 hr 1 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Ascent Audio

Published: 04/16/2013


Synopsis

From “a genuine American Dostoevsky” (The Washington Post): a dazzling, funny, bittersweet exploration of the mysteries of relationship, both human and animal.

When his favorite cat Biscuit goes missing, Peter Trachtenberg sets out to find her. The journey takes him 700 miles and many years into his past-- into the history of his relationships with cats and the history of his relationship with his wife F., who may herself be on the verge of disappearing. What ensues is a work that recalls travel narratives from The Incredible Journey to W. G. Sebald’s The Rings of Saturn. Trachtenberg ponders the mysteries of feline intelligence (why do cats score worse on some tests than pigeons?), the origins of their domestication, their terrible treatment during the Middle Ages. He also looks at the riddle of why any of us loves whom we love and all the unforeseen places to which that devotion leads us.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Cat on June 10, 2013

I wanted to find this book lyrical and profound; Trachtenberg is a wonderful writer, and the idea of using cats as both example of and figure for the force, mystery, and pain of love seems inspired to me. But the book itself seemed pretentious and pastiche-y to me (alluding to every intellectual tou......more

Goodreads review by Florence on September 12, 2013

This author is so worried about his missing cat that he travels from North Carolina where he is working to New York to search for her. (The cat sitter has reported that she is missing.) As filler he writes of his relationship with his wife, religion, philosophy, history, sex, and anything that pique......more