Please Do Feed the Cat

By Marian Babson

Author Lorinda Lucas returns from a book tour of the United States to find that Roscoe, the cat who lives next door, is in alarming shape. Hoping that whatever has hit poor Roscoe will not be caught by her two cats, Had-I and But-Known, she learns from her friend Freddie that both Roscoe and his owner, Lorinda's neighbor "Macho Magee," are more or less prisoners of another author, one Cressie Adair. For an unknown reason, Cressie has decided to move not only into the colony of mystery writers but straight into Macho's house, life, and all nine lives of his cat. For Roscoe, that means an exclusive diet consisting of very small portions of feline health foods. And then Macho, well, his pen name does fit the thrillers he writes, but his real name, Lancelot Dalrymple, is a much better description of the meek little author he actually is. He's restricted to a "health" diet himself, and can do no more for poor Roscoe than surreptitiously leave a window open so the hungry beast can escape to where he might find some real food....

Any colony of crime writers, even though their books are as different as Cressie's "chick lit" and Macho's heavy thrillers, can be expected to contain a good bit of contention. But not many authors are ready to go for murder away from the printed page. In this delightful tale, with its undertone of sweetly malicious humor about self-important writers, you can depend on finding actual homicide: Please Do Feed the Cat comes complete with a murder as well as a cast of writers as varied as their books. Trust Marian Babson for another happy read.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Macmillan Publishers
• Release date: Apr 1, 2007
• ISBN: 9781429901369

Marian Babson

Marian Babson, born Ruth Stenstreem, is an American mystery writer. Her first published work was Cover-Up Story (1971), and she has written over forty-five mysteries. Babson served as secretary of the Crime Writers’ Association and was awarded the CWA Dagger in the Library in 1996.  

Reviews for Please Do Feed the Cat

[ninieb-1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Babson's jabs at editors and contemporary mystery writing are quite funny. The cats are also well characterized.

[justjenniferreading · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I was a little apprehensive to pick this book up, however I am somewhat happy that I did. This is really the first murder-mystery that I have read, and while it wasn't great it did open me up to a new genre that I previously didn't think that I would like.Marion Babson does a great job at developing her characters. Her characters were people I could imagine actually running into. They did not seem to be distant fantasy characters with whom I could not connect.I enjoyed reading this book until the end. The story was built up and I was anticipating the end so much that I was disappointed. Her resolution was very short and seemed to abrupt. I would have liked there to be a little more insight into the ending.Overall I would say that this was very readable and I will be looking for something else of hers to read in the near future.