Guest Writer's Cat Of The Week: Vincent Black Shadow

Name? 

Vincent Black Shadow, though I am technically female 

Nicknames? 

Vincent or Catkin

Theme Tune? 

Music is not really my thing and unfortunately, I am going slightly deaf, but my owner thinks the overture from ‘The Thieving Magpie’ contains the right mixture of menace and skittishness.

Age? 

Only I know the truth- and I’m not being coy here. However when the vet looked at the plaque on my teeth (not particularly pleasant for either of us), he suggested I could be twelve.

Owners? 

Again, I’m the only one who knows the whole story. My present owner is Annabel Markova and I’ve been with her for two and a half years. Before that I lived with her daughter, Sasha, for a few months.

Brief biography? 

Mysterious, like everything else. Sasha found me wandering on a busy road in Brixton, about to get run over. So she took me home, fed me, then put me outside her front door, thinking I might want to return to my owner. But I refused to budge- a wise decision, as it turned out.

Catchphrase? 

‘What will be will be’. Like most rescue animals, I’m a fatalist.

Favourite Habits? 

Lying on my owner when she’s relaxing on the sofa watching television, and putting my arms around her neck.

What constitutes a perfect evening for you? 

Finding a mouse in a wardrobe full of old shoes. Failing that, finding a good spot by the radiator when the central heating is full on and knowing company is in the house even if I don’t feel particularly sociable.

Favourite food? 

Grass. It immediately makes me want to be sick on the carpet and that’s a surefire way of grabbing my owners attention, even when she’s completely absorbed in writing.

Defining moment of your life? 

Being picked up off that street in Brixton.

Any enemies? 

All other cats. I love a fight.

If you could do one thing to make the world a better place for felines what would it be? 

Forbid owners ever to go on holiday s all catteries would have to be shut down.

If you could meet a celebrity who would it be and why? 

Assuming I am allowed to choose a dead one, it would be the American author Hunter S. Thompson because he immortalised the hand-built motorcycle which I am named after. He was also a bit of a rebel, just like me.

Which one of the cats in Under The Paw and Talk To The Tail  would you like to be stuck in a lift with? 

None.  I am quite certain we would fight. And I would win. Of course.  

Annabel’s new novel, The Family Thief   is published as eBook by Blackfriars (the new literary e-imprint from Little, Brown), on June 6^th, £3.99.