Lacey Lancaster's marriage ended in divorce, so she has decided that she will steer clear of men, and be content to live a quiet life alone, alone that is except for her cat Cleo, a beautiful Abyssinian that she had decided she will breed to earn some extra money.Her next door neighbor Jack has been trying to engage her in conversation for months, but she has steered clear. She thinks that he is a womanizer and feels sorry for his "girlfriend" Sarah because she always hears them arguing. When Jack's cat named Dog sneaks into Lacey's apartment and gets Cleo pregnant she decides to make Jack responsible for his cat's part of the problem, and soon learns that Jack isn't the man she thought he was. Can a tryst between two kitties bring their owners together for a happily ever after?I am a huge fan of Debbie Macomber. She creates such memorable characters that are easy to like. In this story Lacey was a bit of a doormat in the beginning, but it was so nice to see her get her self confidence back. She was having issues at work that really was a result of self esteem issues that stemmed from her divorce. Jack was the cute next door neighbor that Lacey misjudged.There was a small secondary story that revolved around Sarah. Loved that Cleo and Dog the cat had a part in the story as well. Overall I would classify this story as a very short novella that while a bit predictable as well as a very quick read was still entertaining. There is a bonus story included in the book titled "The Bet" which was written by Darlene Panzera,the winner of the Readers' Story Contest, and the neat thing is Ms.Macomber chose the winner herself. This was cute. The edition I read is actually being re-released paired with another story, "The Bet" by Darlene Panzera, a contest where the publisher, Avon Romance (who gave me an ARC of the book for review), was looking for similar style stories to Debbie Macomber. They apparently narrowed it down t 3 and let Debbie Macomber pick the winner. :)Both stories were sweet. I normally like more steam, but for a rainy afternoon read with an afghan on your lap (Macomber actually recommends a lap cat for the first one) and a cup of tea, they'd be just about perfect. The new novella is a contemporary Western, so I was thrilled! Though being a novella there wasn't as much description as I would normally appreciate.There were a few issues with both books re: believability, and wrapping the stories up quickly, but they were cute, light HEA reads.
