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Of Cats and Time Travelers

© Robert Powers

Aficionados of cats know it. Feline foes suspect it. In her new novel, Diane Duane makes a strong case for cats possessing an intelligence that dwarfs that of mere humankind.

The Book of Night With Moon (Warner, $12.99) will remind readers of past classics such as Watership Down and Tailchaser's Song, both of which attributed great powers to animals. Author Duane, with 26 novels to her credit, including seven in the Star Trek series, creates a wondrous fantasy world in the midst of present-day New York City.

Three cats, wizards all, have been recruited by the mysterious Powers That Be (no relation, I hasten to point out) to fight the evil that lurks on the opposite site of a gate beneath Grand Central Station. These gates, invisible to ordinary members of the human species, are entrances to alternate worlds.

The feline trio consists of a dainty house cat named Rhiow, a neurotic tortoiseshell named Saash, and a fearless tom called Urruah. Together they prove to be a formidable combination in battling the forces of the dark, particularly when they are plunged into the world of Downside, which lingers in the past.

Duane makes her cat protagonists completely believable, each boasting intriguing combinations of cat guile with humanistic understandings and, sometimes, pity for the poor humans who wander around the edges of this story.

A veteran of creating fantasy worlds, Duane easily draws up a detailed and realistic setting, delving into religion and philosophy. The Book of Night With Moon should capture the fancy not only of cat lovers, but those who crave a cracking good story.

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Connie Willis has become one of the most popular novelists working in the science fiction genre. Her latest, To Say Nothing of the Dog (Bantam Books, $23.95), deserves a spot on the Best of '97 lists. This true "laugh riot" takes the hackneyed topic of time travel and employs it in a delightful and different manner.

Set in Victorian England, with much fun made of the Brits of that era (Ms. Willis herself is English, so she has the right to poke fun at fellow folks from a different era) To Say Nothing of the Dog should entertain those crusty readers who normally turn up their noses at any piece of writing labeled sci-fi. Willis turns the time-travel thing on its head, writing a comic novel which merrily winds its way through an era ripe for ridicule.

The fun begins when a 21st century time traveler is sent to the England of the 1890s after a fellow traveler takes a cat forward from the 19th century. There's been a glitch in the Net, the device which makes it possible to visit in other centuries.

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