Customer Reviews

The Dog Park Club: A Mystery

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

 

 

I picked this up looking for a light hearted, funny read. Given the cover and the title, that seemed to be a pretty safe bet. Unfortunately, I found this novel to be a rather frustrating experience. The first part of the novel is spent in character development, and man these are some great characters. Max Bravo, our narrator extraordinare, is an insufferable snob. He is a middle aged, arrogant, gay opera singer who finds himself a member of this dog park club by way of his friend Claudia, a vain, hyper, self centered, ad executive. They meet a varied cast of characters at their local dog park, hence the title. Gator, Ed, the lesbian couple, Jordi the Spaniard, and Amy round out this strange crew of misfits and mysteries who get together at the dog park, drink beer, and gossip about each other. This takes up about half the book. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed reading about these guys. I really liked Max. He is such an over the top jerk, he's actually pretty endearing. His devotion to Claudia was also a great part of his character. I appreciated his humour and his vocabulary. I especially liked his frustration at people who continuously expected him to "declare a team". All of the other characters were interesting as well. The author did a good job with every one.

I was ready for something to happen, and then Amy disappears. We are then treated to the efforts of the club to find her or "nail her killer". Amidst all this, we learn more secrets about all of our characters, including the missing Amy. The author is mildly successful at creating a bit of intrigue, but it never reached the level of actually being compelling. The tone goes from over the top funny, to really dark, to sad, back to funny and finally ending up at "what the heck?" I won't spoil the ending, but I felt it was just a matter of a lot of work that ended up at nothing. Be forewarned; there's a ghost in this book. What she was doing here besides helping the author move the story along, I don't know. File that ghost firmly under the "what the heck?" category, along with about the entire last third of this novel.

If your'e looking for a lot of doggy fun, there are some great dogs in this book, but they don't play a very huge role. There is some really funny stuff though; the author has a gift for dialogue and she's created a very memorable character in Max Bravo. I just hope she gives him a better story next time. This one left me feeling annoyed. Not a recommend.

As a "mystery," it doesn't work. I read through to the end and thought, wait, did I miss something? Am I supposed to know what happened? Thinking back through it, this is clearly what the author intended, which unsettled me.

I picked the book up because I am from Berkeley and used to live directly across from the dog park. The descriptions of the park and of Berkeley were laugh-out-loud funny (even if you are not from the Bay Area). I also enjoyed the character development, especially the mix of sexual orientations, resistance to gay/lesbian stereotypes, and the acknowledgment that not everyone can be easily classified.

As a book, it was satisfying and I read it through in a single evening. As a mystery, no. The author has talent and the characters are complex and interesting. But she needs to decide if she is a "mystery" writer, or not.

I thoroughly enjoyed both the characters and the plot and wasn't bothered by the ending. The author throws out some interesting red herrings (is this Lacy Peterson redux or is it I Pagliacci? or neither?). The plot is quite different from the standard romance/cozy formula, which I really enjoyed, Robinson's writing is sometimes lyrical, sometimes delightfully zany, and always a pleasure to read. I hope there's a sequel soon.

Spoiler alert! This author didn't have the imagination it takes to come up with an original plot idea, so she took one of the most over-exploited news stories of the last decade, threw in a few twist, created some quirky characters, and there you have a fictionalized version of the Lacy Peterson murder. I haven't finished this book yet, so I am hoping for some devastatingly ingeneous plot twist at the end... but I'm not holding my breath.

I will admit that the writing style is fun at times and somewhat humorous. However the main character, Max Bravo, the sexually confused opera singer is just an annoying, catty queen! He is unlikable, rude, and treats his best friends as if they were doormats. Not someone that I really care about or want to read about in any sequel that may or maynot be forth-coming. (I'm thinking some re-hash of the Elizabeth Smart kidnapping perhaps... And obviously, at some point the author heard that paranormal mysteries were the newest craze, so out of the blue in pops grandma's ghost. A cigerette smoking, beer guzzling gypsy who adds NOTHING to the plot at all.

I would say if you are still interested in this book, get it from the library. It isn't worth the money to own as it is at best forgettable the second you are finished with it.

The Dog Park Club grabs you and doesn't let go. I started reading on my commute on a Thursday morning, and couldn't wait for the weekend to finish it. I read all day Saturday and couldn't put it down until the end. They only problem was I wanted to keep reading after the ending (that always happens with good books!).

I found this book laugh-out-loud funny, but also full of suspense and a little scary. The lead character, Max Bravo, is hysterical and intelligent, and I want to hear more from him. All of the characters in this book are so well developed, I could imagine them exactly, from Max to the tweaker with the pit bull ( I won't give anything away, but it's a great scene). Part 2 was dark and intriguing and kept me glued to the pages. The clever, unexpected ending really caught me off guard, which I thoroughly enjoyed!

I do think the title is a bit mis-leading and doesn't convey the sophisticated, black comedy style of the book. The story takes place in the San Francisco Bay Area, and the characters reflect that city's attitudes and lifestyles. It has nothing to do with cute, charming dogs, though dogs are critical to the story, as they are the common denominator for the characters.

I heard there's a 2nd Max Bravo mystery in development and I can't wait to read that one, too!

Story Description:

Raymond Chandler meets David Sedaris-the first in a dynamite new cozy series that's "a lot of fun, full of unexpected depths and twists." -Josh Bazell, bestselling author of Beat the Reaper

Amy Carter is missing. And there's no one less capable of finding her than Max Bravo.

Max Bravo is a mid-rung opera singer with a diva's towering ego. And he doesn't do favors. Not until the day he visits a troubled friend in Berkeley and offers to walk her dog.

Max quickly discovers the local dog park. It's an odd, private little world-a preserve for neighborhood crackpots and lay-abouts, and, incidentally, their dogs.

But, the park regulars are friendly. Clubby. They even serve beer. Before long, Max can't stay away.

When one of the regulars disappears, Max's interest in the dog park turns to obsession. Amy Carter - beautiful, adored, pregnant, has vanished. The circumstances bode the worst.

What happened to Amy? The dog park club has brewed up a theory. And they mean to prove it.

My Review:

I thought the cover of this book was great which was what drew me to it in the first place. However, the story inside was not at all what I expected. The writing was sloppy and the main character was very annoying. For a man, he was selfish, vain, jealous, and very cruel to some of the other members of the group.

I heard this was going to be a "series" but I won't be reading it.

Very disappointing!!

I'm not a mystery novel reader. I find that many of them fall back on plot to drive a reader along. Not this one. The vocabulary-building writing is wonderfully witty and full of rich details and descriptions. (I would insert an example here but I immediately loaned the book to a friend.) The characters are vivid and amusing, especially Max Bravo, the bi-sexual bon vivant. I recommend The Dog Park Club and its sequel, The Barbary Dogs, which is equally fine.

Has next to nothing to do with dogs. Features a quirky, arrogant, drinking, drugging main character, whose loyalty to his one enduring friend is pretty much his only redeeming feature. That and the fact he has a cool name worthy of a comic book hero, which he otherwise bears no resemblance to whatsoever. Kind of a slice-of-life book, which is fine, but it's not a mystery -- at least not much of one. The first third is truly irritating - one of those "show off the ol' vocabulary to no good end" kind of thing. The writing gets better as the book goes on, but by the time I got to the end, I wasn't entirely sure why I'd bothered. If you like bizarre characters that you'd much prefer to punch, give it a try, but borrow it from the library before you invest in your own copy.

This was a debut book and I hope it will develop into a series. I only gave it 3 stars as I was a bit disappointed in the main mystery plot.

The book begins with a charming character, Max Bravo. Max is an opera singer and is very interesting as a character. I even laughed out loud with his singing and was, at first, interested in Claudia, his long time friend.

The characters at the Dog Park were well-drawn and each has their own story. One goes missing, a pregnant mom who visits the park regularly. This is when the book lost me. Why? Because it felt like a re-telling of the true crime case of Lacy Peterson. The names were changed but the case was the same. I had watched this entire case in real time and I was slightly disappointed that the mystery wasn't more unique. Some facts were changed as to the victims personal life but, I knew what was going to happen next.

I would buy the next book if Max Bravo and his companions were back as they were amazing. Ms. Robinson is a gifted writer and I mostly enjoyed the book.

They say you shouldn't judge a book by it's cover, but you know that's practically impossible. I mean, it's really a matter of once you've judged something by the way it looks, can you move past it and go deeper? For me the cover of this book says kitschy and cozy, not as I found it, intelligent and unpredictable. Once in, it's hard to get out. In fact, when I wasn't reading it, I was contemplating what the characters might be thinking, as if I was as real to them as they became to me. The writing style is refreshing. And, the subtle irony and sometimes sarcastic tone makes it uniquely realistic, and a pleasure to read.