I’m back to tell you about my recent reading adventures.
Owl’s Well That Ends Well by Donna Andrews
Grade: B+
This is another book in the Meg Langslow mystery series. The action takes place right after the events of Crouching Buzzard, Leaping Loon, which I read and reviewed back in October. It’s not really a sequel, since the mysteries are completely unrelated, but having some previous experience with the main characters is helpful.
Meg and her fiance, Michael, have just purchased a big old house in the country. It’s in need of some major repairs and jam-packed with junk collected by its previous owner. Any room in the house that has a solid floor is soon taken over by Meg’s wacky family members as they arrive to join in the requisite yard sale. When a body is found in an old trunk at the yard sale, suspicion falls hardest on Michael’s friend, and Meg slips into amateur sleuth mode to clear his name.
This book is a humorous look at the summer phenomenon known as the yard sale. If you’re already familiar with it, you’ll recognize and be amused by the early birds, the Hummel Lady, the scheming antique dealers, and other yard-sale regulars. If not, you may well wonder what the hell is going on. I would therefore recommend this book almost exclusively to bargain-hunting cozy-mystery lovers, which is probably a much larger group than any of us would like to admit.
A “cozy,” by the way, is not just a tea-pot cover. The term also describes a type of mystery: Light-hearted, usually lacking in gore, and often part of a themed series. Who knew?
I give Owl’s Well That Ends Well a B+ because it’s exactly the kind of undemanding, funny reading you need when you’re down in the dumps. It’s good, like marshmallow froth on hot chocolate, but don’t expect any real substance from it.