Doreen picks Charles out of a litter of kittens at a Brooklyn Museum art class and carries him home through a snowstorm as a gift for her boyfriend David. I’m not sure I want a kitten, he says, but how can he resist? As it turns out David is to be Charles’s person-for-life. Many surprising and dramatic moves follow, back and forth across the U.S.A., as David pursues his calling and his happiness and raises a family, with Charles as an intimate part. An intelligent cat’s point of view sets modern life and love in refreshing perspective.