May 27
Click for full imageJohannah’s Art Direction: Okay, two words: Cat People! Yes, again. But this time we’ll have five of them surrounding a naked guy with a mustache. The one in front will be pointing a gun and the one next to him will be holding a futuristic mobile communication device. And let’s throw in a few of those aliens from the Mos Eisley Cantina for good measure. What’s that sound? Are you crying? Look, those art school loans aren’t going to pay themselves off. Just get painting already.
Awesome cover, excellent rug!
Thanks to Johannah!
(Average: 6.88 out of 10)
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May 27th, 2010 at 9:25 am
Glorious cat people! You’d think someone under heavy guard would at least wear clothes, or body armour. It’s probably in their somewhere and I am sure there are plenty of people who have read and love this one.
May 27th, 2010 at 10:22 am
Editor: ‘I wish to extinguish once and for all the fire of prejudice towards books with Cat People in them.’
Art Director: ‘Here, have some gasoline.’
May 27th, 2010 at 10:37 am
Is one of those cat-people wearing a pearl dangling from an ear chain? I suppose that is how you know who the alpha female is.
May 27th, 2010 at 10:52 am
So this is where furries come from…
May 27th, 2010 at 11:18 am
oh gods the leopard-print background.
May 27th, 2010 at 11:41 am
Mark Hamill’s last Sci Fi Convention appearance didn’t go as well as he planned.
May 27th, 2010 at 12:12 pm
Ageing Luke Skywalker porno lookalike: (thinks) If I hide in the middle of all these cat people, no one will find me.
May 27th, 2010 at 12:15 pm
@James All your comments are coming up as Spam. Have you been a naughty boy on another wordpress blog? 😛
May 27th, 2010 at 12:29 pm
So having never read this one, I am guessing that all the cat people either get slaughtered or are just basically useless.
On the Pretender cover on this site we see he has gone for a different group of protectors. Assuming it’s the same guy, to be fair.
http://www.goodshowsir.co.uk/2009/03/good-show-sir-good-show/
May 27th, 2010 at 12:45 pm
>admin: I wondered why my comments haven’t been appearing immediately once I hit Submit. I’ve not knowingly spammed anyone lately, and I’m scrupulously avoiding sh!t and @rse and all the other swears, so I have no idea what’s wrong.
May 27th, 2010 at 1:50 pm
You know if it were me I would avoid photobombing the Angry Cat Peoples family reunion.
May 27th, 2010 at 2:18 pm
Cat people aren’t real cat people in my opinion unless they are sporting armour that accentuates the crotch area.
Bodyguardz catz is pretending to be gangsta.
May 27th, 2010 at 3:30 pm
Another one I own. (that is 4 or 5 now…) The cover is pretty accurate as to what is in the book.
For the record, yes he is naked, no the cat people aren’t slaughtered or useless. The earings do in fact signify the Captain who wears the most rings. The Cat people are the focus of the book, they happen to find the naked human on a space dock, after he escaped from the Kif (the aliens from the Mos Eisley Cantina)
The first three are really good books, the furry stuff doesn’t show up to book four or five.
May 27th, 2010 at 4:09 pm
Glad you guys like the cover (and the leopard fur background). I picked this book up at a flea market a few months back with the intention of using one of the cat people in a painting. Now that I see the overwhelming interest in cat people on this site, I may have to revisit that idea. 🙂
May 27th, 2010 at 4:30 pm
Cherryh on the cover increases the odds of cat-people or four armed cat-people by 200%.
The books really aren’t that bad, but I’m guessing it is really hard to make cat-people not look silly in illustration. Not unlike any given superhero with a bird themed mask. We slap a cat head on a human body, make it furry, and we’re good to go!
May 27th, 2010 at 5:06 pm
I think you are right Nick, the Cat-people as a concept in sf/fantasy are always going to be inherently cheesy no matter how well they’ve been drawn.
What i dont understand is why they need to be cat people in the first place, is the fact they are genetically decended from cats really a central plot device, or is it that people just think tigers and lions are cool and the author is using that.
I’m gonna bet the bad guys are a reptile/frog human, a baboon style guy , and a vultureman… not to mention an Undead Mummy…. wait, im thinking of Thundercats now… sorry
I’ve still not got round to reading any Cherryh despite a couple of awesome covers we’ve had on the site here.
May 27th, 2010 at 5:08 pm
Cat people all look alike to me anyway.
May 27th, 2010 at 5:58 pm
I’d rather have vulture-people on my side in a space war… because food is often scarce in wars, and vultures eat ANYTHING that’s dead.
May 27th, 2010 at 8:00 pm
Being intelligent cats is a central plot point. They really do act like you’d imagine intelligent cats would act. Not tabby cats, though. No, these are intelligent *lions*.
(Yes, you should be scared. It’s the weird-looking caped guys in the background with the unpronounceable names who are the real bastards though. The kif are *nasty* every-man-for-himself pieces of work, though by the end of the series you do come to see them as more honourable than anyone else.)
May 28th, 2010 at 3:23 am
isn’t that a Michael Whelan cover? (Arguably the most-honored SF artist out there, based on # of Hugos I think). Also, doesn’t that look a bit like a self-portrait of him? Track down the cover of Alan Dean Foster’s ‘With Friends Like These’ for a definitive self-portrait of Whelan…
May 28th, 2010 at 3:32 am
I keep on wanting to look at the rest of the cover, but the Where’s Waldoesque nature of Mark Hamill in the middle of the cats is just drawing me in too easily.
BTW, Johannah bonus points if you really do own any carpeting or furniture with that kind of leopard print on it. Did you get that at the flea market as well? And did it have any fleas on it?
May 28th, 2010 at 9:20 am
What’s wrong with mustaches?
May 28th, 2010 at 9:47 am
Agrajag> It’s not that there is anything wrong with them. It’s just that most men, when presented with a mighty moustache go into a fit of jealously. It is a sad truth that most men know they don’t have the adequate facial hair or the time to dedicate to growing one. They then see fit to poke fun at the very thing they love the most.
Or so I have read.
May 28th, 2010 at 6:57 pm
Jose: That leopard fur is the cushion fabric on one of our dining room chairs – white fiberglas Burke chairs (similar to the ones on Star Trek). They came from a junk/costume/magic shop run by a woman named Beki the Clown ($5 each!). The fabric is from the craft store.
In my defense, fuzzy leopard fur as interior decor is very popular in the states.
May 28th, 2010 at 7:49 pm
Pride of Chanur – Naked and Mustache Deep in Cat People
The creepy on-watchers make think of that scene Requiem for Dream..
Ewww!
May 28th, 2010 at 8:07 pm
“In my defense, fuzzy leopard fur as interior decor is very popular in the states.”
A million flies..?
May 29th, 2010 at 5:41 pm
Anon: Come again? Does not compute.
Are you under the impression that I’m using real decomposing fly-covered leopard pelt on my chairs? I assure you that the fur is synthetic. I’m not a barbarian.
May 29th, 2010 at 6:03 pm
Ahhh, Cat People are so awesome.
May 30th, 2010 at 9:01 pm
I’ve got a different book with this cover picture, and it didn’t occur to me to submit it. Bother.
May 31st, 2010 at 9:04 am
@Johannah:
“A million flies can’t be wrong”
December 17th, 2015 at 2:01 am
This guy’s plan was working perfectly until one of his cat person escorts spotted a mouse person…
December 17th, 2015 at 4:55 am
One of these things is not like the others,
One of these things just doesn’t belong,
Can you tell which thing is not like the others
By the time I finish my song?
December 17th, 2015 at 8:11 am
Leader Furry: “The moment they start shooting at us, we scatter like the wind! Ha! That’ll surprise the hell out of that smug human!”
October 3rd, 2019 at 11:23 pm
delightful space opera series (5books) that tell a tale of human destruction or interaction.