Cat Pay the Devil: A Joe Grey Mystery (Joe Grey Mysteries) [Hardcover]

Shirley Rousseau Murphy (Author)

Book Description

Series: Joe Grey Mysteries | Publication Date: February 20, 2007

"Wilma's in danger!

You think I'm going to sit here polishing my claws?"

When she first hears the news that convict Cage Jones has escaped from prison, Dulcie's fur stands on end. She knows he's after her human companion, Wilma, whom he blames for his stint in jail. She tries to enlist the help of her friend Joe Grey, but the tomcat's got his paws full investigating two local murders. It's only when Wilma disappears after an afternoon shopping trip—and Cage is found lurking at her house—that Joe realizes the two crimes might be more connected than he thought. Paw in hand with the unsuspecting cops, the fantastic felines must untangle Cage's devilish agenda and snare a killer if they ever want to curl up with their friend again and bring peace to their seaside village.

--This text refers to the Mass Market Paperback edition.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Talking tomcat Joe Grey and his fellow feline sleuths, Dulcie and Kit, track an escaped convict in their engaging 12th adventure (after 2005's Cat Breaking Free). Just as the cats fear, Cage Jones kidnaps Dulcie's human housemate, a retired U.S. probation officer, Wilma Gertz, who testified in Cage's probation hearing to prevent his release. The crime rate rises in Molena Point, Calif., with the murder of several area women and the return of Cage's former partner-in-crime, Greeley Urzey—back to reclaim stolen ancient artifacts he and Cage believe Wilma took. As the cats go wild trying to save Wilma, their chatty, anthropomorphic shenanigans might raise eyebrows, but Murphy's surefire plotting makes this more than just another cute cat cozy. (Mar.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

In Murphy's latest Joe Grey cat mystery, there is plenty to keep the three sentient feline sleuths--Joe, Dulcie, and the Kit--busy: three women in the small California town of Molena Point are murdered; Wilma and her niece, Charlie, have been kidnapped by an escaped con bearing a grudge; and that old scoundrel Greeley Urzey is back in town and up to no good. As usual, the felines and their human coterie are appealing (at least to cat fanciers), and the virtually nonstop action will keep the series' fans whipping through the pages. Sally Estes
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 304 pages
• Publisher: William Morrow; 1 edition (February 20, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0060578106
• ISBN-13: 978-0060578107
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.5 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (18 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,458,923 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Shirley Rousseau Murphy grew up in southern California, riding and showing the horses her father trained. She attended the San Francisco Art institute. Shortly after graduation, she married and worked as an interior designer while her husband attended USC. "When Pat finished school, I promptly quit my job and began to exhibit paintings and welded metal sculpture in the West Coast juried shows," Murphy explains. Her work could be seen in many traveling shows in the western States and Mexico. She continues, "But when we moved to Panama for a four-year tour, in Pat's position with the U.S. Courts, I put away the paints and welding torches, and began to write."

She has published sixteen children's books, a young adult fantasy quintet, the Dragonbards fantasy trilogy, and The Catswold Portal. "It was while working on this adult fantasy that I knew I wanted to explore further the fascinating world of sentient cats. I began to see the gray tomcat, whom I knew well in real life, as a feline detective with a brash attitude--and the die was cast. I launched into the Joe Grey mystery series. I like discovering anew with each book how the three cats interact with their close-knit world of human friends--Joe Grey in-your-face abrasive, Dulcie of a gentler nature, and Kit wildly imaginative."

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars fine feline amateur sleuthing, March 10, 2007

By 

Harriet Klausner - See all my reviews
(#1 Hall OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Cat Pay the Devil: A Joe Grey Mystery (Joe Grey Mysteries) (Hardcover)

In Molena Point, California, Dulcie tells her two feline pals Joe Grey and Kit that she is worried about her housemate retired federal officer Wilma Getz, who just vanished without a word from a shopping mall. Joe Grey thinks his friend is being an inane female as her human companion has left home before, but three days have passed and Dulcie is panicking that something bad happened to Wilma especially since Cage Jones escaped from prison, a place he went to because of Wilma's testimony in court.

When someone shoots Wilma's former partner Mandell Bennnett and local resident Linda Tucker is killed, though he cannot see a link, Joe Grey believes that Dulcie is right and Wilma is in trouble. The cat trio follows Wilma's trail to the nearby hills where undomesticated cats reside and learn that someone abducted her and her niece Charlie, the wife of police Captain Max Harper. Assuming Cage and an associate have more than revenge in mind, the cats begin a rescue attempt before Dulcie's housemate and her relative are killed.

Fans of the series will take great delight as the fearsome felines search for and try to rescue one of their human housemates from an avenging killer with an extra unknown (to the cats) agenda. The story line is action-packed as the personified cats discuss the case in English amidst themselves, some wild felines, and a few humans. Though newcomers may have difficulty listening to the animals chatter in human tongue as that is a key premise from the start, long time fans will welcome the latest feline amateur sleuthing.

Harriet Klausner

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars These cats are awesome..., March 3, 2007

By 

Armchair Interviews (Minneapolis, MN) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Cat Pay the Devil: A Joe Grey Mystery (Joe Grey Mysteries) (Hardcover)

Think you would not enjoy a mystery with talking cats--cats that not only talk to each other, but also to humans? Well this one is a really good read, and not at all frivolous or cozy. This is Murphy's 13th book, and as good as the previous ones.

Joe Grey, Dulcie and Kit (all cats) do their best to solve kidnappings, murders, and help their human roommates the best they can, using all their feline skills: their sense of smell, sight, and their ability to get into crime scenes unnoticed. Joe hangs out at the local police department in Molena Point, California, and picks up information that he relays to his fellow sleuths.

In this harrowing tale, Dulcie's beloved human, Wilma, is kidnapped, and then her niece Charlie is taken. The cats are hard put to rescue them. They are up against several very malicious criminals, one an escaped convict with a grudge. Eventually, with the help of the police and a few feral cats, everyone is saved.

The cats are believable, and the clever ways they manage to communicate with those humans who do not know they can talk make this story even more enjoyable.

Armchair Interviews says: If you have not read these books before, you have to try them.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Cats and kidnapping, February 6, 2009

By 

Chrijeff (Scranton, PA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Cat Pay the Devil: A Joe Grey Mystery (Joe Grey Mysteries) (Mass Market Paperback)

Joe Grey, the talking feline detective, is so focused on the recent murders of two Molena Point women that at first he thinks his calico lady Dulcie is borrowing trouble when she worries that her human housemate, retired parole officer Wilma Getz, is in danger. It seems that Cage Jones, to whose release she testified in opposition, has escaped from jail and is on the loose--and Dulcie is sure he'll seek revenge. What even Dulcie doesn't suspect is that Jones is missing something valuable--something he thinks Wilma may have taken from his family's home when it was last searched. And so when Wilma, on her way home from San Francisco, disappears out of a mall parking lot, Joe and Dulcie and their young partner Kit have their paws full.

Though we never do find out what Jones is missing or what became of it, Murphy provides hints enough to give us firm grounds for guessing. And while the kidnap itself is resolved in the first three-quarters of the book, there's still the question of the murders (now totalling three) and the sinister presence of Greeley Urzey, former partner of the devilish Azreal (see Cat Fear No Evil (Joe Grey Mysteries)). Back for a return engagement are Willow, Cotton, and Coyote, the feral sentients rescued in the previous volume (Cat Breaking Free: A Joe Grey Mystery (Joe Grey Mysteries)), who have settled in a ruin up in the residential hills behind the village with a small clowder of gentler talking cats, and whose presence proves critical to the satisfactory resolution of the situation. With all the familiar human characters--Clyde Damen, Wilma, Max and Charlie Harper, Ryan Flannery, Kit's octogenarian housemates Lucinda and Pedric, Detective Dallas Garza--and some new faces, it's a good sound entry into a popular series.