So on to Catfantastic 4, edited by Andre Norton and Martin H. Greenberg. I held off on this review until I could get a list of the stories. My mom has all of this particular anthology series, along with Witch Fantastic, and I read them all years ago. As with the other rereads in January, I browsed this from my mom's shelves during the family holiday weekend.

A quick search reveals that Greenberg has turned this into quite a profitable franchise over the last two decades: cats, witches, wizards, elves, castles, tarot, dinosaurs, horses...In a general way, it doesn't appeal to me, since I'm not particularly fannish or interested in fetishes, which is what these feel like to me. Yes, I went through the stereotypical girly horse-mad phase, and I probably would have loved the Horse Fantastic anthology when I was 13. And while I am fond of horses and many other animals, I am slightly turned off by what I perceive as the sort of obsessive fascination that these books help feed, imbuing the focus with many virtues or as the suffering victim of humanity's inhumanity. Not surprisingly, Bast is referenced frequently in the series. I confess that this is my starting bias, which perhaps colors my reactions to the stories.

The fourth book in the series, many of the authors are represented in earlier works, frequently with recurring characters developed over the course of sequential tales. Others are unique to this volume. Some authors are new or relatively unknown, others are well-established and either writing a cat story as a distinct side project or as part of their previously created milieu.

Certainly, like any anthology of short stories, Catfantastic IV feels uneven in the quality and flavor of the 18 tales in this volume. Some (most, even) I enjoyed a great deal, and others were disappointing. A few deal with very serious or sensuous themes, many are quite humorous; the narrator could be cat or human, depending on the author. They also represent multiple genres: fantasy ("The Cat, the Sorceror, and the Magic Mirror," "Arrows, "The Quincunx Solution," "The Neighbor"); science fiction ("Circus," The Tale of the Virtual Cat," "Tinkerbell," "SCat"); horror ("Miss Hettie and Harlan"), world folk tale ("Noh Cat Afternoon"); contemporary fiction ("One with Jazz"), historical fiction ("Noble Warrior, Teller of Fortunes"), and maybe even mystery ("Totem Cat").

The first ("The Last Answer") was the weakest and exemplified all of the flaws that reinforce my prejudice--way too much exposition, cat as mystical savior, not particularly compelling story or characters, dull dialogue, and so on. Nor did "Tybalt's Tale" or "Professor Purr's Guaranteed Allergy Cure" or "Totem Cat" or "Death Song" suit my palate. Doubtless, other readers would list very different best/worst. On the balance, though, I enjoyed the majority of the stories, perhaps making this better than average.

However, it is much more difficult to pick out my favorites. I would have to say I particularly liked the one-off "Noh Cat Afternoon," based on Japanese literature, "The Tale of the Virtual Cat" with a hint of cyberpunk, and maybe even "Born Again" with its meld of western and eastern themes. As always, the continuing installments of Noble Warrior by Andre Norton, SKitty stories by Mercedes Lackey, and the Flax and Drop serial by Mary Schaub are fun too.

If you like anthologies of this type, you'll love this particular book. My reaction is still meh, which is why I leave it on my mom's shelves instead of rehoming it. This made for pleasant fall-asleep reading while away from home. ( )