Review of "Bending the Paw: A Paw Enforcement Mystery" by Diane Kelly

 

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In this 9th 'Paw Enforcement' mystery, Forth Worth police officer Megan Luz and her German shepherd K-9 partner Brigit help investigate a grisly crime. The book works fine as a standalone.



The story opens on Valentine's Day, when Megan 'says yes' to her firefighter boyfriend Seth.



They'll soon have a blended family: Megan and her K-9 partner Brigit and Seth and his K-9 partner Blast. The betrothed couple hurry to share the news with Megan's family and her roommate Frankie, and wedding chatter commences.



In the midst of the excitement Megan gets a call from her mentor, Detective Audrey Jackson, who says "I'm at a crime scene. A grisly one. Can you and Brigit get over here?" As a K-9 team with a special set of skills, Megan and Brigit are always on call. So they leave the engagement merriment and hustle to the crime scene.....



.....where they find a kitchen covered in blood, but no body.



Detective Jackson explains that a married couple, Shelby and Greg Olsen, live in the home. Shelby returned from dinner with coworkers expecting to find her husband Greg - a movie theater manager who had to work on Valentine's Day - at home. Instead Shelby found the gruesome scene, and Greg and his car were missing.



Megan observes blood spatter all over the kitchen, and several sets of footprints on the floor, including pawprints from the family dog.

Megan allows Brigit to sniff the blood in the kitchen, then orders her to trail. Brigit leads Megan to the empty garage where she sniffs at a blood puddle where the car trunk would have been, sniffs the area where the passenger door would have been, and 'sits' to indicate the trail ends where a driver's door would have been if a vehicle occupied the space.



Brigit's behavior, which is rewarded with praise and liver treats, indicates that the people in the Olsen's kitchen left in the car that had been parked in the garage, perhaps with Greg's body in the trunk.

Megan and Detective Jackson proceed to investigate. They interview witnesses, look at CCTV footage, analyze computers, examine phones, interpret data, and so on.



A fertile area of inquiry seems to be cash proceeds from the movie theater, which thieves may have planned to steal.

In the midst of the Greg Olsen investigation, a hailstorm hits Forth Worth, damaging the roofs of many homes.



Roofers soon flood the city, going door to door to drum up business.



Some roofers become elusive after getting a deposit, and Megan is sent to investigate a claim of fraud.

A homeowner named Althea Nomikos says she gave roofing contractor Tommy Perkins five-hundred dollars a week ago, and he hasn't done a thing.



Megan agrees to look into the matter and uses her sleuthing skills to figure out what's going on.

The story is told from three points of view: Megan, Brigit, and the Slasher who perpetrated the crime in the Olsen home. In Brigit's sections the K-9 thinks about using her sniffing skills to help Megan; the discomfort of wearing dog booties at crime scenes; how much she likes liver treats and belly rubs; how dogs are better at some things than humans; and other dog-related things. Brigit acquits herself well in the story, peeing on the shoes of Megan's nasty former partner and bringing down perps who try to get away.



The investigative parts of the book are interspersed with scenes of Megan shopping for a wedding dress; looking for a wedding venue; arranging for centerpieces; choosing flowers; and so on - all of which adds a touch of fun to the book.



This is a well-researched police procedural that would appeal to armchair sleuths who likes to solve the crime along with the detectives.

Thank you to Netgalley, the author (Diane Kelly), and the publisher (St. Martin's Press) for a copy of the book.

Rating: 3.5 stars