The Real Macaw

Meg Langslow is back in the latest installment of Donna Andrews' bird-themed Meg Langslow murder mysteries, The Real Macaw (#101).  As if life isn't complicated enough with twin four month old baby boys, one night Meg is roused from her sleep deprived torpor by a dog barking.  Not her own tiny little monster, but a big dog.  When she goes downstairs to investigate, her newly-decorated living room is overrun with animals; dogs, cats, puppies, kittens, birds, guinea pigs, and hamsters.  Her father, brother, grandfather and other assorted animal lovers have rescued the animals from the county shelter where the formerly "no kill" policy has been changed by the new County Administrator.  Not that Meg is opposed to harboring these animal fugitives from "death row"- far from it; but couldn't the male members of her family have consulted her first, or at the very least put the animals in the barn? 

Turns out things didn't go exactly as planned during the rescue mission, and as her grandfather tries to get hold of their missing driver on the phone, the police chief shows up with Parker Blair's cell phone in hand, barking away.  Blair's been murdered and the chief wants to know why Meg has been calling him.  In this case, the "real macaw" provides a vital clue.  If you saw the gorgeously-imagined movie Rio earlier this year, you won't have any trouble visualizing the bird in question. 

Not only are Meg's home and barn turned upside down, but so are the town itself and the county as the mystery begins to unravel.  Although the killer is caught, things haven't settled down in Caerphilly by a long shot at the end of The Real Macaw.  I expect Ms. Andrews' next Meg Langslow book will dig deeper into the skulduggery afoot, and maybe we'll find out if Meg's upholstered furniture and rugs can be saved, along with the rescued shelter animals.

I do have one bone to pick with Ms. Andrews about this book.  One of the characters is a New Englander whose accent sticks out like a sore thumb in rural Virginia.  Having been born and brought up in the Boston area, I've experienced a lot of that myself as I traveled the country conducting software training.  I could always make a joke of it and then get down to business.  But it does bug me that at one point when Meg is talking with Francine Mann, she asks her if her home was originally near Boston.  The character replies "Worcester".  Meg goes on to assume that's what she meant because it sounded like ""Woosteh" in her accent."  If Meg has lived her entire life in rural Caerphilly, why should she think that her pronunciation of Worcester is correct, and not that of the person who actually grew up there?  In a previous book, Meg takes to task those outsiders who cannot "correctly" pronounce Caerphilly.  Isn't this the pot calling the kettle black?  Nothing is more jarring or hilarious to a native than to hear outsiders butcher local names (for Bostonians that would include Worcester, Gloucester, and Woburn to name a few.  And what about those shows supposedly set in Boston that are fond of including insects - ants -  in their family trees?)  Okay, now that I've gotten that off my chest, bear that in mind when you read this entertaining mystery and if your travel plans include New England assume that "Woosteh" will make you sound more like a native.