Former Weird Tales
editor Scithers launches a planned series of cross-genre cat anthologies with a vow to avoid the clichéd talking feline. Although the few reprints—by Lovecraft, Leiber and Baudelaire—are classics, the original stories are the real reason to buy this volume. Standouts include K.D. Wentworth’s “Cat Call,” a charming cat’s-eye-view mystery, and Geoffrey Maloney’s “Not Another Black Cat Story,” featuring a novel deal with the Devil, as well as darker tales, like “The Eye of Ra” by Jim Hines, a story of murder and revenge set in ancient Egypt, and Mary Turzillo’s short but effective science fiction story, “Scout.” Despite a few sour notes (most disappointingly in Nancy Springer’s by-the-numbers mystery “American Curls”) and twee moments, Scithers commendably unearths solid new material in a theme that has been milked extensively for decades. (Dec.)
