Customer Reviews

Crossing the Lion: A Reigning Cats & Dogs Mystery (Reigning Cats & Dogs Mysteries)

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Veterinarian Jessica Popper has a unique practice in Reigning Cats and Dogs. Instead of having a concrete building, she makes house calls using her vet-mobile to visit her clients around Long island. Her friends Betty and Winston Farnsworth ask Jessica and her husband Nick to accompany them to Solitude Island where Linus Merrywood, the owner of a Fortune 500 company, died a few days ago; just before his death he called Winston and said someone was out to kill him.

Since Jessica solved several murder cases (see Murder Had a Little Lamb and Monkey See, Monkey Die), they ask her to nose around and see if her investigation can find out who killed Linus, who died from an allergic shock because he ate eggs disguised in a cake. Everyone in the house, friends, family and business associates knew of his allergy and all had a reason to kill him. Detective Falcone asks Jessica to snoop around much to her shock because she is already doing so with the suspects in the house. However, as she begins to piece together the homicide, Jessica needs to be careful because the final answer places her in the most difficult position of her life.

The newlywed protagonist is playing a life and death game of Clue inside of Ten Little Indians with the last one standing most likely the killer. For the most part, Jessica likes the suspects and wants none of them to be guilty. One of the main characters is the house itself which adds a gothic haunting feel to the whodunit as it contains secret passages that lead upstairs to a room where a "crazy" aunt resides avoiding her family. The investigation is entertaining as Cynthia Baxter's provides another fun amateur sleuth mystery that is not "Reigning Cats and Dogs, but instead reigning corpses.

Harriet Klausner

THIS DID NOT HAVE JESSICA PERFORMING HER VETERINARIAN DUTIES. I MISSED HER INTERACTION WITH THE ANIMALS. IT WAS TOO MUCH LIKE THE BOARD GAME OF "CLUE" JUST LIKE SHE OBSERVED. IT WAS A GOOD MYSTERY, BUT NOT THE USUAL FUN THAT WE ARE USED TO WITH JESSICA AND HER REPORTER FRIEND.

the book came very quickly,even before it was supposed to come and was in really great shape.

At the request of her friends, Betty and Winston, Jess heads to an island home to investigate the death of their friend Linus. Arriving at the ghostly-like mansion and after meeting the eccentric family and their staff, once the police states that Linus was murdered, Jess knows one of the people on the island with is the murderer and she'll need to solve this quickly. In a rare first, the lead detective asks for Jess' help in digging up clues. The plot surrounding the mystery was good and the information that Jess culled from her talks had me stumped until the last few chapters when I had an idea of who did the deed.

Fun and easy type of book. Would love to see more from this author.