Lilian Jackson Braun

Life and career

Born Lilian Jackson in Willimansett, Chicopee, Massachusetts, to Charles Jackson and Clara Ward Jackson, she began her writing career as a teenager, contributing sports poetry for the Detroit News. She went on to write advertising copy for many of Detroit's department stores. For the Detroit Free Press she worked as the "Good Living" editor for 30 years, retiring from that post in 1978.

Between 1966 and 1968, she published three novels to critical acclaim: The Cat Who Could Read Backwards, The Cat Who Ate Danish Modern and The Cat Who Turned On and Off. In 1966, the New York Times labeled Braun "the new detective of the year." The rising mystery writer then disappeared from the publishing scene for 18 years. In 1986, the Berkley Publishing Group reintroduced her work to a new generation of fans with the publication of an original paperback, The Cat Who Saw Red. Within two years, Berkley released four new novels in paperback and reprinted her first three from the sixties. Braun's series again rose to the top of best seller lists. The twenty-ninth novel in her series, The Cat Who Had 60 Whiskers was released in hardcover by the Penguin Group in January 2007. Like many writers of her generation, Braun was an admitted technophobe; she wrote all of her books in long hand and then typed them herself.

Little was known about Braun, who was protective of her private life. Publishers long gave an incorrect year for her birth date, which remained unknown until she finally gave her true age during a 2005 interview with the Detroit News. She was preceded in death by her first husband, Louis Paul Braun, a sister, Florence Jackson, and a brother, Lloyd Jackson. She resided in Tryon, North Carolina, with her (second) husband of 32 years, Earl Bettinger, and their two cats. Each of her books is dedicated to "Earl Bettinger, the Husband Who..."

Braun died at the Hospice House of the Carolina Foothills, in Landrum, South Carolina from a lung infection.

"The Cat Who..." novels

1. The Cat Who Could Read Backwards (1966)
2. The Cat Who Ate Danish Modern (1967)
3. The Cat Who Turned On and Off (1968)
4. The Cat Who Saw Red (1986) (Nominated for the 1987 Anthony Award and Edgar Award, Best Paperback Original)
5. The Cat Who Played Brahms (1987) (Nominated for the 1988 Anthony Award, Best Paperback Original)
6. The Cat Who Played Post Office (1987)
7. The Cat Who Knew Shakespeare (1988)
8. The Cat Who Sniffed Glue (1988)
9. The Cat Who Went Underground (1989)
10. The Cat Who Talked to Ghosts (1990)
11. The Cat Who Lived High (1990)
12. The Cat Who Knew a Cardinal (1991)
13. The Cat Who Moved a Mountain (1992)
14. The Cat Who Wasn't There (1992)
15. The Cat Who Went into the Closet (1993)
16. The Cat Who Came to Breakfast (1994)
17. The Cat Who Blew the Whistle (1995)
18. The Cat Who Said Cheese (1996)
19. The Cat Who Tailed a Thief (1997)
20. The Cat Who Sang for the Birds (1999)
21. The Cat Who Saw Stars (copyright, 1998; published, 1999)
22. The Cat Who Robbed a Bank (2000)
23. The Cat Who Smelled a Rat (2001)
24. The Cat Who Went up the Creek (2002)
25. The Cat Who Brought Down the House (2003)
26. The Cat Who Talked Turkey (2004)
27. The Cat Who Went Bananas (2005)
28. The Cat Who Dropped a Bombshell (2006)
29. The Cat Who Had 60 Whiskers (2007)
30. The Cat Who Smelled Smoke (cancelled by publisher, Putnam)

Short stories

1. The Cat Who Had 14 Tales (1988)
2. The Private Life of the Cat Who... (2003)
3. Short and Tall Tales (2003)

Braun was awarded detective of the year from the New York Times in 1966.