Stud

A catlike alien finds romance with a human woman in Brooks’s eighth Cat Star Chronicles tale (after Virgin). Handsome but illiterate Tarq Zulveidione serves as an interstellar stud, seeking to repopulate his almost-destroyed Zetithian race via interbreeding. Lucy Force, trapped by her overbearing father as a waitress in her family’s restaurant, thinks bearing a litter of half-Zetithian triplets would be the perfect escape. Immediate sexual encounters lead quickly to love, challenged by Lucy’s desire for freedom and Tarq’s struggle to feel worthy of her. The 30th-century setting on planet Talus Five is improbably similar to present-day Earth, complete with Kentucky Fried Chicken and blue jeans. More significantly, Lucy and Tarq’s delay in acknowledging each other’s feelings is so drawn-out as to feel forced and artificial, and Tarq’s distractingly exotic genital anatomy is notably more creative and engaging than the characters or plot. (Feb.)