Bending the Paw

October 1, 2020

Officer Megan Luz and her K-9 partner, Brigit, respond to a call from Megan's mentor, Det. Audrey Jackson. They find a Valentine's Day Massacre amount of blood in the kitchen at the Olsen home. The frantic wife reported her husband missing, but it's not likely he could survive if that blood was his. Brigit does what she can at the crime scene, and Megan is willing to help, but there are other crimes to investigate, including a possible scam artist contacting Fort Worth homeowners who need their roofs repaired after hailstorms. Megan and Brigit have a full agenda, and that doesn't even include wedding plans now that Megan has agreed to "form a pack" with her firefighter boyfriend, Seth, and his bomb-sniffing dog. VERDICT Kelly successfully combines police procedural with cozy in a mystery that has moments of humor. Readers of the previous title in the "Paw Enforcement" series, Paw of the Jungle, will be familiar with the author's style of incorporating viewpoints from Megan, Brigit, and the primary criminal. Fans of Spencer Quinn's "Chet and Bernie" books will enjoy Brigit's comments and the dog-human partnership.--Lesa Holstine, Evansville Vanderburgh P.L., IN

Copyright 2020 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

September 1, 2020
A police officer and her canine partner search for a body missing from a gruesome crime scene. A slasher has executed a St. Valentine's Day massacre of his own in Fort Worth. A call from Detective Audrey Jackson summons Officer Megan Luz and Brigit, her K-9 teammate, to the scene, a suburban kitchen covered in blood. It's not the way Megan pictured spending the night of her engagement to Seth, her firefighter boyfriend, but Seth has a dog of his own, and he understands the importance of K-9 teams. When Megan gets to the scene, poor homeowner Shelby Olsen is distraught by the gruesome mess but even more upset that Greg, her loving husband, is missing. She asks Audrey and Megan where Greg could be. The two don't know how to tell her that, given the blood volume they see, it really doesn't matter where Greg is any more. Eager to impress her mentor and prove that she's fit to fill her shoes one day, Megan digs into the case of the apparent murder and the missing body. But all the obvious leads go nowhere, and Megan isn't sure what's next. Interspersed chapters adopt the perspectives of the slasher, who's mainly keeping a low profile at a hotel, and Brigit, who's equally concerned with tracking the killer and scoring some liver treats. At length Megan's investigation leads her to the one and only possible conclusion. The procedural emphasis continues to set this series apart from other dog mysteries.

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