Beware of the Cat

by Michel Parry

children play for hours. the object of the game is to get all the mice to their cheese without being ejected by the cat

Genres: Horror, Anthologies, Short Stories, Literature, Fantasy, Fiction

191 pages, Hardcover

First published October 28, 1973

Reviews

[Graham · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of Parry's sterling '70s horror anthologies and a good companion piece to THE HOUNDS OF HELL. I skipped three here due to already being familiar with them: Blackwood's ANCIENT SORCERIES, an evocative John Silence mystery; Lovecraft's THE CATS OF ULTHAR, a light fantasy bite, and Wintle's Christmas creeper, THE BLACK CAT.

William Baldwin's BEWARE THE CAT is a 16th century account of cat-bothering in rural Ireland, and provocative stuff to open the collection. This is followed by Barry Pain's THE GREY CAT, in which a South American tourist comes into possession of a haunted cat idol with deadly consequences. Classic stuff, complete with a spooky 'what if?' ending. THE KING OF CATS, by Stephen Vincent Benet, is lighter material, a slice of whimsy about a composer with a cat's tail.

THE VAMPIRE CAT is taken from Japanese folklore and one of the most gruesome stories collected here, a classic in the best tradition of that country. Byron Liggett's THE CAT MAN is one of my favourites collected here, in which an old man takes his cats to reside on a Pacific island, with frightening consequences. It's a hugely suspenseful nature-runs-amok story. Le Fanu's THE WHITE CAT is a traditional Irish ghost story from the famous author, while Saki's TOBERMORY is my second favourite, a wonderful skewering of upper class peccadilloes complete with a talking cat.

FLUFFY, by Theodore Sturgeon, offers another talking cat, but in a decidedly more sinister fashion; typically, the author doesn't disappoint. Ramsey Campbell's CAT AND MOUSE is a very '70s haunted house story in which a couple are menaced by ghost cats, and fairly chilling with it. EYES OF THE PANTHER sees Ambrose Bierce having a stab at were-panthers to spooky effect, while finally Ernest Harrison's THE CHILD WATCHER is a short-short with a truly ghastly climax.

[Laura · Rating 3 out of 5]

Anthologists such as Michel Parry, Peter Haining, and Helen Hoke did much to shape my early literary enthusiasms, and this was a book I had on semi-permanent loan from the public library (remember when they had books instead of ranks of computers?) in my early teens. There's nothing remarkable in it that couldn't be found elsewhere, but I should thank Parry for introducing me to Saki's 'Tobermory' and Blackwood's 'Ancient Sorceries'. The first features a spot-on talking cat, a sort of drawling Rupert Everett who is immeasurably superior to the humans he encounters. The second is my favourite of the 'John Silence' stories and depicts one of the most difficult choices in twentieth-century fiction. Would you party with beautiful teenage were-cats in an idyllic French town, or would you be put off by the fact that they worship Satan and your immortal soul would be at stake? Hmm. It's a tough one, but I think I'd just have to lean out of the hotel window and shout 'Here kitty kitty'.

[Ren · Rating 3 out of 5]

Selection #2 for the library's adult summer reading program - fiction/fantasy. This was listed as fantasy/horror, so far I'm not entirely convinced.

Okay, definitely horror/fantasy, neither a genre I'd normally choose. This is a collection of short stories, some better than others. The Cat Man was predictable, but one of e better ones and the last, The Child Watcher, is short, but has a twist in the end that made me go back and reread it. In the end, I enjoyed this more than I expected to.

[Noah Rozov · Rating 1 out of 5]

Well, I got my hands only on Ramsey Campbell's Cat and Mouse and that was a waste.