Dead Cats Bouncing

edited by Gerard Houarner and Gak
Bedlam Press (PO Box 540298 Orlando FL 32854-0298)
$13.95

Can this anthology be taken seriously? Does a dead cat stink up the room?

Well, serious may be overstating the point, but since my friend and colleague Garrett Peck has already written the more clever review, I'm going to stick with literary criticism and point out that Gerard Houarner's Dead Cat is at once sympathetic and pathetic, survivor and victim, victor and cosmic loser. He is EveryCat. He is Us, were we all four-legged felines. Looking like a mummy-wrapped cross between Bill (Ack!) the Cat and Simon Bond's infamous expired feline in the irreverent classic 101 USES FOR A DEAD CAT, Houarner's Dead Cat made his debut in the story "Dead Cat Bounce" (which is included here for reference purposes). Grotesquely funny, it also manages to make a subtle statement or two about the afterlife, such as it is, that may await us. Or our pets. Or both.

The concept of a half-mummified, reanimated cat whose adventures in this and other worlds are mostly exercises in masochism attracted such immense talents as John Skipp, Paul Di Filippo, Jack Ketchum, Tom Piccirilli, Edward Lee, Charlee Jacob, David Niall Wilson, Brian Keene, and Yvonne Navarro, among others. The co-editor, artist GAK, brings his black and white illustrations, and everybody brings a dose of black humor and their autographs to make this a rather quirky collectible package.

Without ruining too many plots for you, let's just say that the Dead Cat stories that leaped out at me the most involve "Too Many Hells" (Terry McGarry), finding human love (Jack Ketchum), making it with a real famous cat named after footwear (Edward Lee), meeting "dead" antagonists (Gene O'Neill), meeting a goddess and bringing down the house at a cat show (Charlee Jacob), finding peace (Brian Keene), and sharing a "Raven"-like rap with a rat named Jake (John Skipp). But though the book's full of contenders, only Gerard Houarner himself can rock Dead Cat's world with an insanely lustful and perverse Dead Mouse in the orgasmic "Dead Cat and Mouse," which proves that others may follow, but an original is still the best.

This is the sort of project with which the small press excels. It's the sort of labor of love—yes, a cliche, but true—that is never ruled by a conglomerate's need to feed the bottom line. It's safe to say no large publisher would have touched such a niche anthology, where sales may well be limited to diehard fans and/or friends and relatives, which is deplorable. But it's comforting to know that those of us who appreciate books like this precisely because of their uniqueness can still find some despite the Barnes & Nobilization of our world.