Eye of Cat
| Eye of Cat | |
|---|---|
 Cover of first edition (hardcover) |
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| Author(s) | Roger Zelazny |
| Cover artist | Stephen E. Fabian |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | Science fiction novel |
| Publisher | Underwood-Miller |
| Publication date | 1982 |
| Media type | Print (Hardcover) |
| Pages | 216 pp |
| ISBN | 0-934438-66-8 |
| OCLC Number | 20154669 |
Eye of Cat is a 1982 science fiction novel written by Roger Zelazny.
[edit] Plot summary
When the galaxy's most skilled hunter is asked to use his skill to protect an important political mission, he realizes that he needs specialized aid. Thus Billy Singer must seek the telepathic creature only known as "Cat", whom he had caught and trapped for a museum. Cat agrees to help on the condition that, once the mission is over, he be given the chance to hunt his former captor. Billy accepts Cat's offer. However, Billy has been growing increasingly fatalistic in the time leading up to the story, and originally offers to let Cat kill him with no struggle. Cat, a hunter refuses, encouraging Billy to flee. Billy does so, but remains fatalistic, with Cat reading in his mind a wish to die and his foreknowledge of a final location. Billy must reconcile his personal chindi to evade Cat. Billy turns increasingly primitive, away from the technology of the day, and eventually returns to his Navajo roots.
[edit] Notes
The dedication page reads "To Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee", two Navajo Tribal Police characters in detective stories by Tony Hillerman. Zelazny took much inspiration from Hillerman's stories of Navajo life and culture. Hillerman repaid the compliment by having one of his characters reading a Zelazny novel while on a stakeout.
The creature "Cat" is referred to as a Torglind Metamorph, last of its kind from a planet long since destroyed when its star went nova. The alien's plight parallels that of Billy Singer, who has become displaced from his people and traditions.
The book also contains several long cosmogonic poems with many beings from the Navajo pantheon in as characters.
[edit] References
- Levack, Daniel J. H. (1983). Amber Dreams: A Roger Zelazny Bibliography. San Francisco: Underwood-Miller. p. 37. ISBN 0-934438-39-0.
- Chalker, Jack L.; Mark Owings (1998). The Science-Fantasy Publishers: A Bibliographic History, 1923-1998. Westminster, MD and Baltimore: Mirage Press, Ltd.. p. 669.
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