Strange Powers of Pets

Pets do the darnedest paranormal things. Li-Ping, a black cat, tracked down his mistress after she moved from Sandusky, Ohio, to Orlando, Fla. ``And it is unlikely that he could have read a roadmapsic even if he did hear the name, `Orlando, Florida,' '' the Steigers solemnly remind us. A deeply discouraged brother and sister from Bristol, Pa., claim to have discovered that Lady, the woman's German shepherd, ``had been reincarnated to give them a sign of hope.'' Some of the Steigers' anecdotes are more conventional (pets rescuing their masters from burning homes or cars, pets scaring off intruders), but every story is offered as proof that the animals who share our lives are in touch with something more than the urges to eat, sleep and be scratched behind the ears. The premise seems benign enough, even if the evidence smacks of the tabloids (indeed, many of these stories first appeared in one). The trouble is, the Steigers (coauthors of Hollywood ) have a much, much bigger design in mind. ``Telepathy would be an easy task to accomplish if the minds of all living creatures were somehow united in a great universal mind pool,'' they write. To jump in at the deep end, they suggest pet horoscopes, numerology, some simple master-to-pet telepathic exercises and a ``vision quest to discover your totem animal.'' (July)