The Ship's Cat is the epic story of a cat called Ahab, a scrawny black tomcat from a Basildon high-rise, as he hops from boat to boat in a global circumnavigation of the Seven Seas which takes him to new countries and cultures. For Ahab, this is an odyssey into human nature whose apparent purpose is as mysterious to him as the good winds and good fish yields that perpetually attend his presence at sea.
When Ahab turns up on a baggage reclaim belt at Dalaman Airport, no one knows how he got there, not least of all the cat himself. The label on the suitcase he's emerged from doesn't offer many clues either - half-torn off, a groggy Ahab can only make out the following sentence: TRANSIT ERROR. URGENT REDIRECT - DALAMAN. The passenger initials are "C.S.".
Minutes later, Ahab is weaving among the thronging crowds of Dalaman, his matted fur baking under the Mediterranean sun. He soon finds himself in a cove where a lone fishing boat gently bobs at a mooring. As an 'indoor cat' with a strange obsession for water, Ahab has spent many a day gazing longingly at the glittering Thames Estuary from behind his glass-suctioned window bed on the 17th floor of a Basildon high-rise. And now here he is at the ocean's edge. Is it fate?
This is to be the start of an epic adventure into how he got here, and an even more epic adventure into how he gets home... It is the beginning of The Ship's Cat: 9 Boats, 7 Seas, 1 Cat.
