TOTAL CAT MOJO: The Ultimate Guide to Life with Your Cat

Cats are evolving as they navigate from living in the wild, to a life spent indoors with humans. The resulting problems that inevitably follow when two species try to get along in a shared space, but don’t speak the other’s language is the core of Jackson Galaxy, the New York Times bestselling author of Catification, and host of Animal Planet’s My Cat From Hell’s, latest book, TOTAL CAT MOJO: The Ultimate Guide to Life with Your Cat.

Galaxy kicks off this charmingly illustrated guide with a story surrounding a phrase he coined: Cat Mojo. What is it? Why is it important that our companion cats have mojo in the first place? It’s something we all notice, but may not have a word to describe it. Each of our cats have it to varying degrees, but each cat is different. At their core is a confident creature either yearning to blossom (and who needs our compassion and support to get there) or one who is already strutting his or her stuff, but may be causing other strife in the human home.

As others have written before him, Galaxy dives deeper, underscoring that we can never truly understand our cats until we look at the world through their eyes, not our own. We cannot have a relationship, yes, relationship with our beloved cats without getting to know what makes them tick.

Galaxy hits this point home in a heartfelt, passionate way, nearly imploring all of us to get down on all fours and look around. It’s a different view of the world from under the sofa or on top of the ‘fridge, when we’re terrified of the dog, the kids, or simply being a stranger in a strange land—as cats often feel entering their “forever home” for the first time.

To get to know our cats, Galaxy starts at the very beginning. It’s like we’re on a date with our cat and the first question we ask is “Where are you from?” He and co-author, Mikel Delgado, Phd, go into great detail about where cats were first known to exist millions of years ago, along with a timeline of how they slowly, but surely began a journey, living closer and closer to humans until only recently (less than 100 years), they began to live indoors with us full-time. This part of the book effected me deeply. It was a reminder in ways I hadn’t considered that my fluffy, purring, sleeping-on-my-lap-cat, is still a hunter, not far removed from his wild-child ancestor.

Being out of touch with our cat can result in all sorts of behaviors that we humans consider unacceptable. Those “bad” behaviors can lead to a terrible ending, literally, for the cat, when they get surrendered to a shelter, kicked out on the street, or worse, and Galaxy lays down the challenge line asking us to reconsider this label.

Once you understand your “Raw Cat,” Galaxy provides a section he refers to as his toolkit, a little like his guitar case, filled with in-depth information about the particulars of how cats spend their day, their natural rhythms, their need for predictability in their environment and what happens when that gets disrupted.

TOTAL CAT MOJO: The Ultimate Guide to Life with Your Cat, at 345 pages, is a must-read for anyone who just got their first cat or who has a cat or two (or eight), but who finds themselves completely frustrated by their antics. This book is filled with “ah-ha” moments, clearly written as if you’re in the room with Jackson himself and he’s your private tutor. Galaxy includes occasional asides that remind us he’s been there, too. This is no preachy tome. It’s very accessible to any cat lover and I highly recommend it.

Where I feel this book hits a bump in the road is with the amount of catch-phrases or special lingo. That said, if we are to truly understand our cats, perhaps we need a new lexicon and if so, this is it.

©2017 Robin AF Olson. Kitten Associates foster kitty, Annie Jones, showing off her #TotalCatMojo.

What I loved about TOTAL CAT MOJO: The Ultimate Guide to Life with Your Cat was that Galaxy gave reason after reason why free-feeding kibble is bad for your cat and for a cat to be truly Raw (and therefore closer to his ancestral self) he has to be fed a raw meat diet. He also goes into depth about the often dreaded litterbox issues many people face (Galaxy refers to it as “Raising the Yellow Flag”). I have a feeling many who read “Cat Daddy’s 10 Litter Box Commandments—Quick View,” will cheer, knowing that at last they have hope of a remedy that will work for everyone, humans and cats alike.

TOTAL CAT MOJO: The Ultimate Guide to Life with Your Cat is the universal translator to understanding your cat’s language and why it’s vital we be willing to invest in a deeper, more compassionate relationship with our cat. Cats have been misunderstood for decades, with deadly consequences, but with Jackson Galaxy at the helm, those notions are changing, and for that I applaud his efforts.

TOTAL CAT MOJO: The Ultimate Guide to Life with Your Cat is available NOW!

If you want to SEE Jackson Galaxy LIVE and in person, he’s starting a book tour starting November 1, 2017. Pop over HERE to get details of when he’ll be in a city near you!

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Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from tarcherperigee. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

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