Emotimancers and the Impending Feline Overmind by Beth Pratt
I was really surprised when I found out that the author of the quirky outsider comic “Barely Representational” had written a novel. It came out on kindle about a week ago.
The story starts at Bradford and Chadwick, a major publishing house dedicated to publishing emotion spells. Stanley, the nebbishy publishing assistant, has to go through the slush pile and find the few morsels of publishable material among the piles of derivative and heavily feline emotion spells from people who think they are talented magicians.
Spells are heavily feline because most magicians use cats as conjuring subjects, and as a result, the cats are starting to gain magic powers, including telepathy and thought control. The diabolical Mr. Boots hopes to channel their newfound power and dominate humans once and for all.
Stanley meets Heather, a member of a secret organization dedicated to bringing down Mr. Boots and her evil plan. (Mr. Boots is female).
What I liked most about this novel was that it made me laugh out loud. Pratt hits my wavelength of humor perfectly. I especially loved Mr. Boots’ hilarious tangential stories about cats she knows (the one about the tabby who “only” needed 14 hours of sleep was so funny I had to read it to a co-worker). While there were a few grammar and formatting quirks, it was fast paced and funny.
I recommend it for people who love cats, people who hate cats, and people who write (or know someone who writes) novels.
