ANNE MCCAFFREY WROTE A WHOLE BOOK ABOUT THE BARQUE CATS

[snarp]

SHE DID

IT'S CALLED "CATALYST"

OH NO WAIT IT'S A SERIES oh god

Barque cats - for those who didn't spend middle-school reading horrible science fiction novels about the love lives of space psychics - are large, intelligent telepathic cats who enjoy being in zero gravity and can warn you when there's a problem with your spaceship. I totally wanted one when I was twelve, though I unfortunately didn't have any zero gravity to keep it in.

This sentence is in the synopsis:

When corrupt government officials declare a plague and plan to destroy animals across the galaxy, including the Barque Cats, two young people (a veterinarian and a cat person), a clever Barque kitten and the boy who is its special person, an ancient Egyptian cat with mysterious powers and a hidden agenda, and a con man join forces to try to prevent the tragedy.

You know, I don't think that's a sufficiently rag-tag band of rebels. We still need, like, a disillusioned ex-cop with a drinking problem, a quick-witted halfling thief, a robot who wants to learn to love, and the Doctor. Get with the program, McCaffrey.

Actually, sorry - Elizabeth Ann Scarborough's name's on there as co-writer. Given McCaffrey's recent health problems, Scarborough may be the actual author of this excellent work. Especially considering the whole "an ancient Egyptian cat with mysterious powers and a hidden agenda" business. That is a very Scarborough kind of idea. Also, this is the sequel (which is called Catacombs):

The barque cats, mistaken for a public health hazard, flee Earth for the feline-dominated planet, Mau, with the help of Pshaw-Ra, a mysterious cat with his own spaceship. Oddly, no one--including the humans--is bothered that he plans to take over the universe on behalf of felinekind.

Yeah, I see the invisible hand of the Scarborough in that storyline. It sounds like it might actually attempt humor, a property which McCaffrey has always scorned.

...I admit at this point that I'm kind of thinking about reading these.

Comments

[ross-teneyck.livejournal.com]

...the feline-dominated planet, Mau...

Really? "Mau"?

(OK, I don't know why it should be that part out of all of it that makes my eyes roll the hardest. But it is.)

[james_davis_nicoll]

...I admit at this point that I'm kind of thinking about reading these.

Allow me to throw myself on this grenade. However bad you expect it to be, it's worse.

[snarp]

Surely not! I am convinced that these must be the best books of the decade.

What is the mysterious Egyptian cat's hidden agenda, and how does it pilot the spaceship that it apparently has?

[james_davis_nicoll]

Some kind of plan to Dominate the Galaxy using the technology it got from cat-worshiping humans.

[smillaraaq.livejournal.com]

Heh. While I did indeed spend middle school wading through bad SF by the truckload, including vast amounts of McCaffrey, I do not remember telepathic alien cats! When did they come in? I pretty much quit reading her stuff sometime in the mid-to-late-80s, so I'm guessing it must have been from some later series.

(Where oh where is all of the cheesy telepathic critter SF for dog people, damnit?)

[snarp]

The cats were in the Pegasis/Talents series starting with The Rowan; they were a pretty minor element.

(Where oh where is all of the cheesy telepathic critter SF for dog people, damnit?)

I can't think of any SF, but for fantasy, Robin Hobb's Assassin series. Also, if wolves are acceptable, there's Jane Lindskold's Firekeeper series, or if the telepathy is optional, Lirael, by Garth Nix. Firekeeper is the cheesiest of these by several of whatever unit of measurement is appropriate to cheese measurement.

[smillaraaq.livejournal.com]

*Googlety* Ah, OK, that explains it. I think I probably read the initial Talents short stories that were out by the 1970s, but I don't remember a damn thing about 'em, and definitely didn't read any of the later stuff.

And hee, yes, telepathy and cheesiness are both quite optional, and wolves are acceptable! But I'm somewhat more hair-triggery about bouncing off conventional medievaloid fantasy. Hobb, I've never read; Lindskold I've read the first book, was pretty meh about the world and the prose and most of the human characters and mostly wanted to see more of the wolves; Lirael I absolutely adored -- this icon's from a pic of Lirael and the Dog I commissioned from Pentapus on LJ. In SF, I loved the Tines in A Fire Upon The Deep, but haven't really come across much of anything comparable since...

[james_davis_nicoll]

Didn't Elizabeth Bear write a book where manly Vikings bond with wolves and then have hot man-sex with the other manly Vikings bonded to wolves?

[estara]

Indeed, with Sarah Monette, and it sold well enough that a follow-up will be coming out.
A Companion to Wolves - I quite enjoyed it ^^.

From what I remember the two decided they wanted to write a book that took the animal spiritual partner/sidekick/mascot/symbiont whose emotions the human partner shares ~ a la Valdemar companions or Anne McCaffrey's dragons, for example - to its logical conclusion.

[smillaraaq.livejournal.com]

I've not read those yet, though they're lurking on my get-round-tuit List of Doom. But my recollection from dropping in on EB's journal when it was being written is that it was indeed intended as more of a deliberate deconstruction of all the telepathically-bonded-animal-companion-wish-fulfillment stuff in Lackey, McCaffrey etc. -- so while I find the idea very interesting, I'm still curiously looking for examples where it's played straight, just with dogs instead of cats/horses/cats/dragons/cats/hawks/cats/etc....

[estara]

I sort of think I must have read a straight dog companion story at some point, but can't for the life of me remember the title - so maybe it really is just my imagination. I do remember lots of normal dogs as important pets in my ya, romance and in some sf&f vaguely, but not the bonded animal, no.

[sophisted]

I will highly recommend/second Robin Hobb's Farseer Trilogy, but only if you have a VERY HIGH tolerance for extremely whiny POV characters and everything-ever-goes-wrong syndrome. I had just enough of this tolerance to finish both FitzChivalry trilogies, but for me it was a very hard task made bearable primarily by wonderfully loveable secondary characters. The Mad Ship trilogy, set the same world, is so much better in my opinion, but it lacks psychic canid bonding.

[smillaraaq.livejournal.com]

Hmm, I have never read anything by Hobb. Are we talking more or less whiny than, say, Thomas Covenant?

[jinian]

The books already mentioned, less. The Soldier Son trilogy's protagonist, though, is at least as whiny as Thomas Covenant and considerably dumber.

[smillaraaq.livejournal.com]

Hmm. Does he at least manage not to rape anyone and then spend the rest of the series using his crime as a convenient excuse for more manpain?

[jinian]

No, which is why I managed to read as far as I did, but he has extra helpings of stupid-about-oppression and stupid-about-fat that mean if he raped anyone in book 3 I'll never know.

[sophisted]

I skimmed through the SS trilogy with my eyes permanently rolled, so I may have missed some oblique mention of rape, but afaik, it never happens. Thank god. Nevarre was bad enough on his own without adding something like that.

[sophisted]

You're right, I was unfair to Fitz. He is so much less annoying than Nevarre. And despite my warning, I actually like FitzChivalry, I just have this thing where I want to smack him across the head more than the other characters ever get around to doing.

[snarp]

I will say that Fitz was more whiny than I could eventually handle; I gave up on book 3 around the halfway point.

In general, my impression of Hobb's work is that she's drawn to stories about The Horrors Of Life Beating Down On Our Heroes And Destroying Their Spirit, And Then They Get Better. But the process by which they get better is slow, grinding, and frequently drenched in self-pity. Though Hobb's characters are more psychologically realistic than many in epic fantasy, they tend not to be people whose heads you want to spend much time in.

[jinian]

I was feeling fairly stabby by "called Catacombs" but the summary nearly gives me the ability to kill with my brain. (Cool!) However, if you wanted to read and review, I'm sure I would be willing to laugh at your misery.

[starlady]

This sounds like Diane Duane's Wizard books gone horribly, horribly wrong.

[snarp]

That was the feeling I got from the sample, yes.