“Our brains are made so that we can only love a cat as a cat and not as a bird or an elephant. If we want to love a cat, we want to see a cat, touch its fur, hear it purr, and get scratched if we get our petting wrong. We don't want to hear it bark, and if the cat started growing feathers, we would kill, study, and finally, exhibit it as a monster.”

What a wonderfully chaotic, cringe, and uncomfortable read. There’s a talent in making a reader laugh one moment and cringe the next, before the page is turned. I think most readers will decide within the first three pages if they can get into this novella, needing a certain level of perverse curiosity, or if they’ll bug their eyes out and say “NOPE”. 

Told in a rapid fluid monologue, our narrator is visiting Dr.Seligman and while the doctor has his head between the patient’s legs, our narrator begins a story of how they dreamt they were Hitler. What follows is our patient unburdening themselves of all the inner strifes they are carrying, frankly it reads like unfiltered anesthesia word vomit. Unhappiness in their life, body dysmorphia, fear of turning into their mother, inequality in gender norms, guilt of nationality, and the reality that having sex with a robot would make life easier. 

This is a book that explores identity. How do we determine our identity, can we change our identity, and frankly how much of our identity is determined outside of our control. 

It’s a story I loved and it had me laughing, had me questioning why I was laughing, and should I be laughing, all in one paragraph. 

It was considered too taboo to be published originally in the authors native tongue, and while it’s a book I loved and enjoyed fiercely, I don’t recommend it to many. If you do end up reading it and loving it, I like you. You little wonderful weirdo. 

“You know when you look back at your life and suddenly can't pretend anymore that you didn't know something? In some ways, I have always known that I was a barking cat.”