Cat’s Paw: Watership Down meets the Terminator — with cats

I recently had the privilege of editing a young man’s first book. That book was Cat’s Paw, by Robert Anson Hoyt. Yes, that Hoyt, the son of the redoubtable Sarah A. Hoyt whose work I’ve reviewed here in the past.

It was an … interesting … book.

It’s about a group of cats and this bird.

You see, there’s this giant bird, and it rubs it’s beak on this mountain, and when it wears away the entire mountain the universe comes to an end. There’s exactly one rub left.

Then there’s these cats.

Two sets of them.

One set, the Cat Royal Family, who are the ones who actually rule the world, (this is true actually, ask any cat) and whose job it is to stop Happy (the bird) from rubbing it’s beak and then this cult of ninja cats who are trying to see to it the universe ends.

To this end they’ve managed to kill the entire cat royal family, or maybe not.

Regardless, if you add in plenty of dry British humor — from an author from Colorado and a horde of truly pissed-off killer squirrels (they’re just not fond of cats) a drunken junk-yard cat named Tom (our hero) a pregnant Persian by the name of Fluffy, a male cat who grew up in a library and is named Guinevere and you begin to get an idea of the sort of mad-cap ride you’re in for.

I originally said it was like Watership Down crossed with the Terminator.

That’s true.

It’s also a bit like Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy — on acid.

Yes, it’s that funny.

In all it’s a hard novel to pin down. Do the characterizations need some work? Yes, a little, it’s a freshman effort and so there are a few things that I’m sure he’s learned from it and will do better the next time around. Indeed, it’s rare for a first book to be worth publishing in the first place and add in the boy wrote it at thirteen and you begin to see the demented genius behind the book. The biggest problem is simply that it kind of defies description. Is it a fantasy? Well, sort of. Adventure story? Well, yes, but that’s not all it is. Romance? Leaving aside the main characters are talking cats? Yes. Thriller? Yeah, that too.

I know it was shopped to dead-tree publishers and I suspect most of them, liking neat little categories to put things in, scratched their heads, drooled a little (we all know editors drool right?) and then sent it back because it was just so different they didn’t know what to do with it.

Their loss.

Look, I don’t know quite what to call this book either. I just know it’s one of the funniest things I’ve read in years.
It’ll be available soon from Naked Reader Press. They have lots of other novels there as well. Pick up a couple while you’re going by.

(In the interests of full disclosure. I do do {do-do, heh} work for Naked Reader from time to time, such as this book. In addition Sarah is a friend and business partner of mine here at Otherwhere Gazette. Take that for what it’s worth. I wouldn’t give a book a good review for those reasons if it didn’t deserve it. Actually, I wouldn’t review a book that didn’t deserve a good review unless it was so egregiously bad I felt it was my duty to warn people off. I may do a couple of those for you soon as well.)

Cross posted to Death by 1000 Papercuts.