'The Meowmorphosis': A big fuzzy kitten goes Kafkaesque -- TRAILER

They’ve joined zombies and Jane Austen, androids and Leo Tolstoy, and now Quirk Books is taking a very soft and cuddly kitten on a journey through the disturbed imagination of Franz Kafka.

The Meowmorphosis is the latest of the imprint’s “mash-terpieces,” a mashup of classic literature with geek-fueled fancifulness — or in this cast Fancy-Feast-fulness. Author Coleridge Cook starts with the German scribe’s surreal and nightmarish 1915 novella The Metamorphosis, but instead of transforming into a giant, insect-like creature, protagonist Gregor Samsa now wakes up to find he has become “an adorable kitten.”

“The Meowmorphosis is a more psychological sort of horror-comedy, so we wanted a trailer that would convey that Kafkaesque blend of itchy, claustrophobic, nervous energy and utter absurdism. And, of course, the urgency of a cat who wants to be on the other side of a door,” says Quirk editor Stephen H. Segal.

Check out the trailer below. The publisher’s works have become hot properties in Hollywood, where Pride and Prejudice and Zombies is set up at Lionsgate and has just secured Lars and the Real Girl director Craig Gillespie, while 20th Century Fox’s Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter is currently shooting in Louisiana.

The Meowmorphosis is out May 10.