The World According to Bob: The Further Adventures of One Man and His Street-Wise Cat
By: James Bowen / Narrated By: Kristopher Milnes
Length: 6 hrs and 6 mins
Maybe not my favorite, but gosh I love James and Bob!
Maybe it’s that I so recently listened to A Street Cat Named Bob, but some of James Bowen’s actions in The World According to Bob caused some eye rolling, and some curling of toes. He’s a rather impulsive individual, feels when things are unjust, and takes actions that simply made me groan because they’re so self-defeating. But at least he always owns up to how he shouldn’t have done them, and he tries to make amends.
Other than that, this is a wonderful, wonderful book with the wonderful, wonderful Bob, the most awesome cat I’ve ever heard about. And he and James go through more trials and tribulations and some of them are quite heartbreaking. James shows the lives of those living hand-to-mouth, one illness away from being homeless yet again. He personifies their struggles, and it’s devastating to listen to.
In The World According to Bob, James confronts two serious illnesses, complete sobriety, more unemployment, but through it all is the ever-loyal and ever-loving Bob. And even there, James has to question: How fair is it to keep an animal when you can barely keep yourself going? It’s sad; it’s pathetic. It’s almost tragic.
And here we see public attention coming to his relationship with such an amazing cat. YouTube, newspaper articles, even, can ya believe it: A book deal! How will that shape their lives?
It’s healing to the heart to hear. Really, no two individuals deserve such nifty attention as much as James and Bob do. Even with their modest success, James has to deal with being portrayed as the scruffy man with blackened teeth who somehow earned the total trust of a cat.
This is a really good listen, and Kristopher Milnes again turns in a really good performance as the downtrodden, sometimes despairing James Bowen. There’s some minor profanity (life on the streets) that’s oddly “bleeped” over which is rather jarring, but it’s a sweet story that deserves to be listened to!
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