Growing up on a farm in Texas, I had many pets—at least seven dogs, four cats, a bird, two rabbits, and a hamster.

I’m Emma Jameson, author of the new book A Death at Seascape House (Jem Jago Mysteries #1) and I have four cats. Four of them. Things escalate, mistakes get made, and one day you wake up with a quartet of fuzzy masters.

For every writer who could never write without a cat at their side, there’s another writer, sitting at their computer, trying for the hundredth time today to lovingly, gently nudge the cat off the keyboard.

Meet Brie and Pablo, my two little muses, who are my calming influence, lying lovingly by my side while I gaze out of the window, leisurely pondering my next chapter. All is tranquil. Not!

At the end of 2015, we lost our 17 year-old orange tabby cat, Oberon. He’d been sick for some time, so it wasn’t unexpected, but it was hard all the same.

They say every writer has a muse and mine is a black-and-white cat with long whiskers and an obsession with butter.