Mort(e) by Robert Rupino

Published by Soho Press on January 30, 2014

Mort(e) is sort of an animal apocalypse story, a refreshing change from the omnipresent zombie apocalypse genre. While zombie apocalypse stories are told from the point of view of surviving humans, Mort(e) is told from the perspective of a talking cat. The best novels about animals, like Animal Farm or Watership Down, teach lessons about human society. Mort(e) tries to do that ("human resistance is a testament to the power of belief") but its primary lesson is: Don't step on ants. They are a formidable enemy, best left unprovoked.

Sebastian is a contented housecat until the female half of his human household has an affair with a dog owner. Sebastian befriends the dog -- a first in his life --but greater changes come when Sebastian, like other animals, develops human intelligence and physiology, along with the ability to speak and use weapons. All of this has been instigated by ants. Thanks to ant scientists, giant ants have swarmed the cities, leaving human dust in their wake. The intelligent Sebastian takes the name Mort(e).

So far this sounds like a really bad movie with subtitles that you wouldn't bother reading. Mort(e) is nevertheless a good (albeit flawed) novel. The story's internal logic and vivid imagery makes it easy to suspend disbelief, at least until the second half when religious imagery takes the story in unconvincing directions. Robert Repino manages the neat trick of creating sympathy for ants, who justly (from their singular perspective) regard humans as "an unfortunate anomaly staining the elegance of the animal kingdom." Other animals eventually join the revolution, having been convinced by the ants that humans have always treated animals as slaves and food. Given that ants eat each other and live in a society that is based on subjugation, the ants' complaints about human behavior seems a bit hypocritical, but the ants never seem to notice. They're just tired of being stepped on, which is understandable.

The plot runs off the track when the war between humans and animals introduces a weapon that is initially understood to be a virus. Without revealing too much about it, I can say that the plot thread and much of the story that follows is unnecessarily convoluted. The eventual revelation of the truth behind the weapon struck me as silly in a way that talking cats did not. The second half of the novel is not nearly as engaging as the first.

Mort(e) nevertheless explores interesting questions: If humans were created to have dominion over animals, why do animals bite us? If animals acquire human intelligence and abilities, will they use them for better ends than humans? Is freedom necessarily better than being a pet? Can anyone, human or animal, get along with ants?

Repino exhibits some creative thought in Mort(e). I like the notion of the Queen ant as a kind of supercomputer, assimilating all the data (scents, sounds, and sights) collected by other ants. I like the idea that people who are desperate for salvation will fashion saviors from unlikely sources and will attach religious significance to facts they misunderstand. On the other hand, some ideas (like a "catpedo," a torpedo holding a cat that ejects molten metal to drill into rock but doesn't cook the cat) are just preposterous.

Mort(e) is, in the end, an offbeat love story. It doesn't quite work but the underlying sweetness and the clever ideas offset the many scenes that seem to have little point. My sense is that Repino had a great idea but didn't know how to develop it. Much of the novel works, some of it doesn't, but the end result is entertaining.

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