KING OF THE CATS and Other Tales

Eight ordinary and superfluous stories, based on the folklore of Brittany and set in that province, where a woman named Mam Marig is supposedly telling them to her goddaughter. In the stories, a little girl is harassed when she steals a jacket belonging to one of the korrigans (a version of the little people); a little man called a lupin hatches from an egg and promises to work at night for solitary Tante Yveline as long as she refrains from glimpsing him at work; a fisherman is lured by a siren; a loup garou breaks his enchantment; and, in general, old material is unimaginatively recast. Carlson's lame elaboration on the title story, ""The King of the Cats,"" merely weakens a good, authentic anecdote, and Mam Marig's down-to-earth and intentionally off-the-point closing morals aren't funny or pithy enough to justify her bracketing presence.