Baptizing the Cat

Baptizing the Cat, a psychological novel, is both serious and comic, a trip with the subtleties of evil and their consequences. The protagonist, Phillip Craine, is a disgruntled 45-year-old artist, who lives with his wife and two daughters in St. Petersburg, Florida. Phillip s view of the world is egocentric and artistic, and though morally bankrupt, he s trying to find some meaning in his life. For the 12 years of his marriage he has passed himself off as a CIA agent, which gives him the freedom to come and go as he pleases. His wife Susan is overweight, wealthy, and passively in control. Still, Phillip has been faithful to her in his fashion. In this story, Phillip sees an intriguing woman on the beach and is struck by her looks and her attention to the man she is walking with. Out of boredom and curiosity, he decides to purchase equipment in order to spy on her. The following chapters describe his spying activities, some almost disastrous. Throughout the novel, Phillip is seeing the world through a painter s eyes, and he paints a portrait of Catherine that is an artistic breakthrough for him. Although Phillip is not a sympathetic or heroic character, he is believable, an interesting, talented, and intelligent man on the verge of doing the unthinkable. Phillip in many ways is the classic outsider to the wealthy life of his wife s family, to the Catholic religion, and to his own odd mother s and grandfather s world.