"The Cat and the City" by Nick Bradley

An audio book. Some of the chapters could nearly be short stories. Characters appear in more than one chapter. I think the cat (or cat-woman) always appears. A book of SF cat stories is often mentioned - the cloned cat chapter may be one of those stories. I wasn't concentrating enough while listening to this. The notes below are patchy.

• The Blue Cat - Naomi, a schoolgirl, asks Kentaro, an old, arty tattooist, to do a tattoo of Tokyo on her back – his first female client. It takes years. Sometimes she brings him things that she’s bought in a zone he’s doing. She doesn’t want people depicted. He does a cat. But it moves from session to session. He thinks it’s sometimes outside his door.
• Fallen words - Ohashi used to be famous. Now he’s 64 and homeless, staying in an abandoned capsule hotel than a cat led him to. He used to have a beautiful wife and daughter. He has an estranged brother. He doesn’t drink. He gets rounded up prior to the Olympics.
• Street Fighter 2 - A man finds that a female colleague shares with him an interest in Street Fighter 2. While they play they discuss being middle siblings.
• ??? - A taxi driver describes his job. His daughter in New York is expecting. He has a crash
• Case Notes 1 - A detective's notes. When he's asked to search for missing youths, he’s not paid much. When asked to get evidence that spouses are cheating, he’s well paid.
• Chinese characters - Flo, an American, thinks herself a Japanologist. She likes an SF book of cat stories written by Ohashi’s father when his daughter was dying. She’s translating a novel, then is disappointed to find out that a translation has just been published. When she’s groped on a train and nobody helps, she has a meltdown, in English.
• Autumn leaves - Mari (30s) and George (40s, an ex-UK policeman) are together. His photo shows are flops, though Mari shields him from it. He imagines about sexual deviancy, but when they try a MMF threesome, he watches, reading poetry. She’s excited.
• ??? - A prof’s daughter likes cats, but is dangerously allergic to them. With the help of his robot Rob, who likes puns, he clones ("prints") a cat, making changes so that it doesn’t trigger an allergic reaction. There’s a MMORPG game involving cats cooperating. Sliding doors are mentioned. There are alternative endings. The daughter mistakes the dangerous original cat for the cloned one.
• ??? - Men talk about their friend the taxi driver. He lost a leg. They talk about ghosts and wives. The tattoo'd girl comes in.
• Case notes 2 - His office is broken into
• ??? - Satchiko (friend of Mari) lives with her mother who chats up the 30 y.o. postman Shingo. When Satchiko's boyfriend can't go to the festival with her, her mother organises Shingo to go with her.
• Prophylaxis - A car factory worker whose parents have died drugs prostitutes so that he can spend the night beside them. Once it didn't turn out well.
• Some friends talk about their fear of going out, or going to school. One is teased because he has a Korean mother. The like Manga.
• Case notes 3 - The missing youth is found
• Opening ceremony - the daughter and family return from New York. She's ashamed of her uncle. The tattoo artist dies.

“she thought to herself” appears. I guess it's ok. I note in the reviews that the book is illustrated. I stayed interested enough, but didn't see the point of some of the chapters - Prophylaxis, or the detective thread.

Other reviews

• Katy Guest (The book is ostensibly a collection of stories, linked by the same little calico cat)
• Alice Violet (The main arc - such as it is - is the reunion of a broken family: a homeless former alcoholic (Ichiro) who is particularly friendly with the cat, his lonely taxi driver brother (Taro), and the taxi driver’s daughter (Ryoko) who has moved to New York. But there are some more minor resolutions that really stayed with me: Keita’s redemption, Flo the lonely translator making a friend at work, and the agoraphobic hoarder (Naoya) who, through the cat, becomes friends with a troubled 11-year-old boy (Kensuke) and begins to recover as a result. ... I didn’t like all the characters and stories. ... while some readers get pleasure from spending time with awful characters, I’m not really into it at all)