PEOPLE AND OTHER ANIMALS:

About the Book

The book is a memoir drawn from the journals and observations of the author who documents a journey across the US to an unknown city in Northern California’s Bay Area. The narrative belongs to one who always expects the unexpected. The neighborhood is new and the author explores the streets and terrain on foot. As the characters emerge, the essence of the city reveals itself. A silver haired woman next door who feeds feral cats, a reclusive couple across the fence who nurture wildlife, curious occupants of a no-pet building, a paralysed man with an emotional support cat and a menagerie of wild and tame creatures in the author’s backyard. A feral cat enters the author’s home, giving birth to a kindle of kittens. Here begins a story of nurture which weaves itself into a lifetime’s commitment to animal love. The author, domesticating the young family, plunges headlong into a web of animal rights activists and rescuers. The rhythm of everyday life is colored by the antics of a family of cats. The cycle of life is sweet. Sometimes bittersweet. It defines for the reader the amity between humans and animals from a nearness and depth that is rare to find.

About the Author

INDRANI SIRCAR is a freelance writer, artist and photographer who left Canada to make her home in Northern California. An ardent animal lover and animal rights activist, she came to the U.S., unfettered by assignments, to find a life among new people in an unfamiliar nook of the Bay Area. With a sense of adventure, she became a retail bookseller and developed a fascination for the retail industry, working in eclectic jobs, keeping her passion for animal rescue in the forefront. Indrani was born to Indian parents and spent her early years in Southern India before coming to New York to complete her graduate studies. Her years in Canada were spent with her spouse with whom she collaborated in establishing, Deadline Yesterday, a communications company. Through two decades in the Bay Area, she kept a journal on her encounters with other animal lovers and her experiences with her own pet family. She has nurtured and fostered animals and continues her efforts to care for wildlife and feral cats. This is her first book.