The Fire Cats of London

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Yes. We have given basic plot outline and it is necessary to mention some aspects of the plot. See also my cautionary note at end of this review. Any dogs or cats? Lead characters are wonderful wild cats. An antagonist is a British Blue cat. Many other talking creatures play key parts in this story too. Asta however is a character to cheer for as she does everything to survive and then help other animals. Three brave humans helping free animals from their cages is heartening but frightening too as they are incredible danger every time they try to save an animal. Hmm. We must command the Lord Mayor to pull down all the houses in front of the fire, so it has no fuel to burn, then the fire will die down.

When her chance to flee comes with the help of a clever raven, she takes it, only having to face fires deliberately set across London. Ash is still clear in her thoughts as she avoids one danger after another. There are plenty out there, and each is just waiting to serve up a treasure of literal magical resource, fun and adventure with a personal touch. Deaths from the pestilence had already started to ebb, and new infections were declining by September 1666. The descriptions of first the hunters, the apothecary and then a fair that only keeps animals to bet on in fights are authentic and brutal, so this book isn't for the soft hearted.

So, without further ado, it is our pleasure to present, The Fire Cats of London by the hugely talented Anna Fargher! Two comets appeared in 1664 and 1665 and were interpreted as harbingers of The Great Plague and The Great Fire respectively. People were also nervous that the biblical number 666 in 1666 indicated evil was brewing. Samuel Pepys wrote: ‘For the whole year, the population of London had a great sense of foreboding, because the year had the number of the devil in it – 666.’ Two young wildcats, Asta and Ash, are captured from their home in a beautiful forest and taken to apothecary’s shop in London to be used to create all sorts of medicines and potions and tinctures. It’s the summer of 1666 and superstition is rife with anti Catholic and anti foreign sentiment. Asta is desperate to escape London and return to the wild forest, but she has to fight against a perilous plot that is threatening the city and not just the caged animals within. Sold to an ruthless apothecary who uses their whiskers and blood for his many concoctions to sell as medicine, Asta is desperate to escape her cage. There is already another cat (Beauty) living with the apothecary and it slowly causes a rift between Asta and Ash. Ash begins to believe all Beauty's lies, and decides is quite happy to stay in the house and give up the wild, but Asta refuses to be tamed.

Famously, only six people are recorded as dying in the fire. The truth is that most of those who died were poor, working, or lower-middle-class making it almost impossible to know how many people actually died. Anna Fargher was raised in a creative hub on the Suffolk coast by an artist and a ballet teacher. She read English Literature at Goldsmiths before working in the British art world and opening her own gallery. The Umbrella Mouse is her first book, which she wrote on her iPhone notepad during her daily commute on the London Underground. She splits her time between London and Suffolk where she is often found exploring the coastline and marshlands under the huge East Anglian skies. The Umbrella Mouse was selected for the Waterstones Book of the Month. One beacon of hope is Miriam, a Dutch widow who is also an astrologer and herbal medicine practitioner. She knows of Asta’s and Ash’s plight but is reviled by Rathder and Moore because she does them out of business and is a foreigner. She also tries to rescue animals from the arena. In those days when people wrote diaries, instead of using pens they dipped feather tips in ink and wrote with that instead. Courageous animals, human kindness, secret tunnels, the River Thames, ruthless medicine men and roaring flames of the devastating Fire of London, layer the story with one menace after another. How can a wild cat survive?The artwork for this story, which appears throughout, is terrific and fun. I think it certainly adds to the whole feel and acts to temper the story for the younger reader. But before they could use fire hooks, the people of Pudding Lane needed to ask the Lord Mayor if they were allowed to – and he had to say ‘yes’. The story starts on Pudding Lane, in the home of Thomas Farriner, a baker who lived with his family above the bakery. Thomas Farriner’s bakery was actually located just off of Pudding Lane in Fish Yard, which is now today’s Monument Street. The author's note in the rear of the book gives some information about real wild cats in Britain and the decline of so many other species. Details of the real life people she based some of her characters on is also interesting as well other facts and figures from this terrible time in London's history.