The book tugged at my heart in the most delicate way possible. Every chapter was written so charmingly that it brought me to tears, especially the first two chapters. They evoked memories of stray cats I’ve met throughout my life, memories that left a deep impact on me.

The writing and storytelling were also very easy to follow. It gently took you on the journey of meeting all those sweet cats without ever feeling forced. It invited you to sit down and enjoy, without begging for your attention, which, to me, feels so refreshing. It’s rare for a book to have that kind of effect on me.

What a joy it was to receive the ARC of this book, thank you!

It's always a bit hard for me to properly review memoirs. I definitely fell in love with the cats at Powts Square and as a bonus, i found the writing engaging and easy to keep reading. This is sometimes a sticky point for me in memoirs but I didn't have trouble getting through this one. Admittedly it was a bit more of a downer than i anticipated in a lot of places, and could've done without the entire chapter that basically equated to "men hate cats and women and control their wives." overall a compelling read. I respect the TNR work Gustafson does and her love for cats, i just wish that had been more so the main focus of the book and it did wander off into other things that made it feel a bit choppy at times.

What do you do when you move into a house and discovered you have acquired thirty feral cats? If you are the author, you change your life. For the better. When she does backstory, she did have many issues with which she had to contend but often came across as being rather shallow and self centred. But once she opened her heart and her home to these wayward souls, something magical happened. She flourished and she grew and she became the person she was meant to be.

There are parts of the book that are heart wrenching as any pet parent can attest. She could not save them all and some would die. She was able to continue but not before she performed her own ritual to deal with the grief. She also became a celebrity. Or rather her cats did. She took a video and posted it on TikTok and was amazed how many people she connected with her cared deeply about her kitties too. From the money she earned on line, she started to do more rescues in other areas of Tucson. There are a number of very moving stories about how she was able to save not only the cats but some of the people forced to live in pathetic conditions. And she did it in anonymity. It was and is all about the cats. Bless her and every other rescuer or volunteer.

Five purrs and two paws up.

I didn’t know about Courtney or Poets Square prior to picking up this book - I just loved the watercolor cats on the front and thought I’d enjoy reading about someone taking care of a feral cat colony. Though I think fans of Courtney’s social media accounts will especially like this book, it’s totally not necessary to know any background before you jump into this. I really enjoyed looking through the Poets Square Instagram highlights, where you can see pictures of the cats she talks about in the book.

There was so much in this book not only about cats but also about growing up and finding and building community. The storytelling was incredibly engaging, and the book felt cohesive even without a specific structure beyond “woman moves into house that surprisingly comes with thirty cats.” I devoured this in two days and it was beautiful and sad and hopeful. I would recommend this to anyone who loves cats or animals in general, or those who like incredibly niche memoirs.

Poets Square: A Memoir in Thirty Cats is the memoir of Courtney Gustafson, author by choice, cat rescuer & cat influencer by chance.

Courtney moves into a house in Poets Square to find out that her new home comes with a feral cat colony, population: 30.

She also shares the greatest love story of ever told: Sad Boy & Lola. May we all be lucky enough to experience love like theirs.

She tells the stories of not only the cats, but her own. She beautifully draws parallels between their existence, and her own life.

In advocating for these cats, she begins to advocate for her community, and finally, herself. Her journey, and the journey of the cats who have felt her love, is heartwarming, & wonderfully told in this memoir.

Thank you to @netgalley & @crownpublishing for this ARC, from the bottom of my heart. I remember falling in love with Sad Boy and Lola on TikTok and pounced at the chance to request it! 🐾

i loved this book so much. i have been following the tiktok/Instagram for Poets Square Cats since at least late 2021/early 2022 and it's been so wonderful to see someone do so much good for a community. i would often talk to my therapist about how upset and angry i am with the world and how much bad there is in it but then there are people like Cortney who remind there are good people who care about others and want things to be better for people and animals. i knew going into this, it would be an extremely tough read and i cried multiple times. i am usually someone who doesn't go for nonfiction, but i knew the second Cortney announced her book that i would read it. its everything i expected to be and so much more and just adds to the admiration that i already have for her. for all that she does for both animals and humans, doing the work she does to better her community makes me feel like life isn't to terrible and i really appreciate that.

I have followed Poets Square on socials for years. I of course fell in love with the cats and had myself a "Sad Boy Summer", but this book gives a fresh look at the stories you don't see and a glimpse at Courtney's life. Animal rescue is one of the hardest things a person can dedicate themselves to and this shines a light on the love and loss of it.

Poets Square is a lovely blend of the authors personal story and the story of the thirty cats that changed her life. I loved the way the cats saved Courtney and inspired her to find community and meaning. The thirty cats at Poets Square were only the beginning, they became her livelihood through Tik Tok and Instagram. She found resources to rescue hundreds of cats throughout Tucson AZ. The stories were interesting, The writing felt natural. At the beginning I was concerned this might be a memoir about the author's mental health issues, but it seemed balanced and my take away was that the book was uplifting and inspiring. A cat lovers delight.

Thank you Netgalley for an advance reader copy!

My soul needed this. I feel so much less alone. So many beautiful thoughts that so many people should consider. Thank you Courtney for all your work helping these helpless cats.

I got this advanced copy through NetGalley.

this is everything i'd hoped it would be when Courtney announced she was getting published. i've followed her and the cats for years, and getting to know more about her through these tiny creatures has truly been a gift.

more than anything, this memoir speaks to the human condition and the universal need for belonging. Courtney tells her own story of loneliness and despair while also sharing pieces of the people she's met. her stories of cat rescue end up painting pictures of the people who fall through the system's cracks and end up forgotten and struggling, much like the feral cat colonies she helps.

it's strange to think that these little creatures are such a ubiquitous form of comfort, and that they have the power to make us better if we let them.

the way Courtney views her life and the world around her is so special, and her words have made me feel a little better and think a little differently about my own life. absolutely perfect little memoir.

Come for the cats, stay for the poignant life stories.
Courtney does such an amazing job evoking emotions on every page. Not only does she paint each cat so well, but she packs in so much real life to the stories too. You wouldn't expect a memoir of cats to teach you so much about love, grief, sense of self, community, mental health, and more, but Courtney does it so beautifully.

Touching, reflective and incredibly vulnerable, Gustafson tells her story in short vignettes that are both engaging and deeply insightful, humorous and heartbreaking. While the stories do tell about the cats, they are also stories of Gustafson's exploration of self and her relationships with the people around her.

I really, really loved this. I also will say (without being a hater) that I really appreciated how Gustafson tells the stories of the animals without moving the reader too far into either saccharine sweetness or over the top melodrama, something that I think can be a fine line to walk when telling animal stories. Gustafson is a talented writer, easy to read and perfectly paced. I think this one is gonna have huge broad appeal.

I highly recommend! Poet's Corner releases April 29th. Thank you to @netgalley and @crownpublishing for the advanced reader copy.

“Sometimes it seems like the sweetness between the cats has seeped into me. Sometimes I feel like I deserve it”.

This book tells the tale of Courtney Gustafson and the 30 feral cats that live in her yard. That’s what I thought when I started reading this but it’s so much more than that.

I gotta admit that I’ve been following Poets Square Cat for a couple of years now. As a cat enthusiast and cat rescuer myself, I loved following the stories of these feral cats. We get to hear the incredible stories of Gustafson’s cat rescuing adventures while also hearing about brutal reality of life and womanhood. I commend Gustafson’s vulnerability in this book and wish I could give her a big hug! This is so much more than a book about cats, it’s a book about love, grief, and community.

Thanks NetGalley for this arc!

Give me anything involving cats and I am sold.
But really, I'm not super big on memoirs and I actually really enjoyed this one a lot. I absolutely loved the way she weaved the stories of her life with the stories of the cats she has rescued and cared for.
I have followed Courtney on both tiktok and insatgram for a few years now and have always enjoyed reading her posts, as she has some really beautifully written captions, so I am not at all surprised I enjoyed her writing in this book.
Overall, a very lovely memoir!

A sweet memoir about the comings and goings of cats in a woman's life. I hadn't heard of Courtney Gustafson previously but I would definitely keep an eye out for her work in the future (especially if it also happens to be about cats!). Heartfelt, funny and very interesting, I loved reading this one.

This is a compelling read that relates the struggles of cats to the struggles of humans, all the while impressing upon the reader the importance of looking after feral cats and getting them the care they need.

Booktube video monthly wrap up featuring this book coming soon.

Throughout this beautiful, almost poetic, memoir, Courtney Gustafson weaves a web of emotion that is hard to crawl out of after you finish. With threads of anxiety, depression, grief, and all those bigger, unnameable feelings, she forces the reader to feel the deep emotion she writes of, whether or not they’re up for it. Told through both flashbacks and her present day life in Poets Square with her famed 30 cats, she tells a story of girlhood that is so deeply relatable it is almost painful to read.

What a charming and lovely book! This is a must-read for cat lovers and really all animal lovers. I have been following Poets Square for a few years now, and was thrilled to see this book coming out. Not only does Gustafson talk about her rescuing experience, but she also weaves in tales about her own life. I preordered a physical copy of this book, and am looking forward to a re-read once it arrives!

Perfect for lovers of cats, but most importantly, lovers of people.

When you usually hear "the internet is fake", you think of skinny, tanned models on luxury yachts. Not that your favorite cat rescue Instagram might be winging it as she goes like the rest of us! Poets Square: A Memoir in Thirty Cats is an honest look behind the curtain at the very real person behind the account.

“I started an Instagram account for the cats because I had too much love form them, scary amounts of weird obsessive love for these creatures in my carport who could, at any moment just die. I had a creeping sense of how big my grief would become. I was inviting someone to share it with me. Please, I was saying. I cannot feel this much by myself.”

Of course, Courtney Gustafson didn't mean to inherit a feral colony of 30 cats when she moved into a rental house with her boyfriend during COVID. But here she was, and there they were. Gustafson, like most of us, didn't know exactly what to do about her situation and initially thought she could ignore the pitter-patter of kitty feet on her roof and the big sad eyes of the kittens in her yard. But soon enough, she was cataloging each cat, spending hours and money to care for them, running an Instagram account and her own cat rescue.

None of this happened by accident, but it all happened organically and with hard work. Told in essays, Gustafson takes us through her life, her insecurities, and her duty to these cats. She's fearful that she can never do enough to save every cat, that maybe she's only doing it to prove she's a good person. She recounts sleepless nights searching for feral cats, digging through hoarders' homes to rescue dozens of kittens living in squalor, and the gut-wrenchingly human mistakes we all make when we care too much. While caring for cats all around Tucson, she meets all sorts of people living in various stages of poverty whose dedication to the roaming cats breaks your heart- because there is only so much we can do. The chapter "The Hotdog Man" will stick with me for so long. I knew the cats that lived there, but never their story.

I found Gustafson's musings on her emotional state beautiful in their openness and rawness. Her longing for community is all too real, and when dealing with the constant crisis mode of animal rescue, she feels herself slipping. But, those following her online and those in the local rescue community always came through and helped her find that purpose and drive to continue.

“I wanted belonging to be something I could inherit, something I could step into fully formed. I imagined community as a space I could passively inhabit. It would be so many years before I learned that community was an action, something we build and rebuild and contribute to. That belonging is something we invent.”


Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an advanced copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!

this was a sweet, compulsive, easy to read memoir about a woman who rescues feral cats in her neighborhood. she weaves in vignettes about her upbringing, family, and identity through stories of cats that she had saved and cared for. i love the overarching themes of community and care, as well as her commentary on gender, race, and systemic failures in our society that she finds ways to connect to her stories of being the neighborhood cat lady. i loved this book!