Cat Striking Back

Joe Grey Mystery, Book 15

By: Shirley Rousseau Murphy

Narrated by: Susan Boyce

Length: 9 hrs and 10 mins

Publisher's summary

On a lovely moonlit night, while carrying a gift of mice to a litter of kittens, Joe Grey stumbles upon a murder scene. Behind an empty house, in an empty swimming pool, there’s blood, the smell of human death, and drag marks. But there’s no victim—and it’s hard to prove a crime without a corpse. 

Driven by stubborn feline curiosity, Joe Grey sets out to investigate. With Dulcie and Kit following him along a killer’s trail, Joe discovers evidence of conflict among the residents of this seemingly peaceful neighborhood—multiple signs of breaking-and-entering, with nothing of value stolen. And they find something far worse: hints of violence yet to come—and more planned murder.  

With the help of local ferals, Joe, Kit, and Dulcie must now thwart a killer using the most unorthodox means at their disposal: a criminal’s unnatural yet powerful fear of cats.

©2009 Shirley Rousseau Murphy (P)2013 AudioGO

Murder Discovered During Delivery of Live Mice 😆

This series just gets better and better . . . Cat Striking Back begins with Joe Grey delivering supper to a local mother cat and her litter of new kittens . . . a nice bunch of live mice 😆. He is hoping that Mango, the mama cat will use at least one of those mice to teach the male kitten to hunt, but Mango is busy nursing those babies, and all of them are hungry. When Joe gets there, there's more than he bargained for, smelling the scent of blood and seeing bloody drag marks at the bottom of the empty pool, he knows that there has been a murder . . . Yet when he returns, he finds that they have been hosed away. When the cats (anonymous snitches) call in the crime, the police are able to find blood spots, but still no body. Sage and Tansy, cats from Hell Hag Hill, the wild clowder, where Kit came from, see more than either Joe or Dulcie, but Sage is weary of people. Tansy has a yearning to visit the town where she used to live, but she's conflicted about her feelings for Sage. 😍 I got a good chuckle out of the cat antics in this one. Excellent addition to the series, and great conclusion to the story.

Another good story

Enjoyable as all the previous ones in the ongoing saga of sentient cats and their people!

enchanting mystery story

Joe Grey, a talking cat, with his other two cat pals are still sticking their noses in every crime in their small town. A very entertaining and original story with great characters make this series a fun easy read.

Trigger warning

While just as wonderful as the rest of the series, this particular book should come with a trigger warning. The violent death of a young cat is rather graphically described. This may be traumatic for more sensitive readers. Beyond that, the story is well written, and beautifully performed as usual.

another good book from this series

I continue to find this series fun. A few of the books I find a tad melodramatic but this wasn't one of those.
If you're looking for a cozy mystery with characters of reasonable intelligence this series is for you

I love all of these books but…

I’m a little upset with this one. **Spoiler Alert **
I think Sage had been trough enough. The whole thing with the hammer was not necessary. It helped move the story along but hurting Sage again simply did not need to be part of the story. I’m not interested in BS well life’s not fair. These books are part fantasy if I wanted that much reality in my fantasies I could go watch the news. I expect a certain amount of violence in a mystery book. The writer controls the story. The hammer hitting Sage was just above and beyond. In my opinion bad move bad/unnecessary storytelling!

Too macabre for me

Very different from most of the “Joe Grey” mysteries. I really didn’t care for the story line.

love these cats

Simply love the cats and the mysteries her books are awesome. Thank you 😊

another add to my collection!

ms Murphy writes one heck of a story! and this was no different! Joe Grey, Dulcie and Kit are up to their usual shenanigans and they'll take you on quite the ride!
..at the end of each book tho, im still left wondering, will Max Harper ever figure out the cats' secret, or be let in on it?! the suspense..!=)
😻😻😻

Engaging Book

Mystery abounds throughout the entire book. I never quite determined "whodunnit" until the end. Satisfying read, for sure.