Author:	Roger Zelazny
Copyright:	1982
Date Reviewed:	9/3/84
Rating:	3.0

Synopsis: Billy Blackhorse Singer is a tracker. For years Billy has tracked animals from many planets to be brought back to an Earth zoo. Now he is asked to track a rebel shapeshifter who plans to kill the Secretary General of the UN. The only way he can stop the shapeshifter is to seek the aid of Cat, another kind of shapeshifter whom he captured and placed in a zoo 50 years ago. At that time he didn't know if Cat was sentient. It is. Cat agrees to help Billy if afterwards he will allow himself to be the hunted. Cat kills the shapeshifter and then, according to the bargain, pursues the hunter. In his flight, Billy learns about his problems, and doubts if the new world can exist with his ancient primitive training.

Review: I got very little out of this novel. Zelazny is regarded one of the best new science fiction authors of recent times. I find him very difficult to read. His prose is very poetic and it takes many passes to get little meaning. As for this story, it simply was not interesting. I didn't care about Billy, whether he killed Cat or vice verse just didn't matter to me. The plot is simply a ramble from place to place. There's no story. I also didn't like the fact that many parts of the book seemed outright plagiarism of recent stories --shapeshifters ("Valentine's Castle"), intelligent dolphins ("Startide Rising") and killing an opponent with a laser landslide ("Where No Man Han Gone Before").