Beaglemania by Linda O. Johnston

(#1 in the Pet Rescue Mystery series)
Genre: Cozy Mystery
Format: Kindle
Read: July 18th to July 24th

Links

Linda O. Johnston – Website
Amazon – Paperback ~ Kindle
Add to: GoodReads ~ LibraryThing

Summary

Lauren Vancouver is the head of HotRescues, a no-kill animal shelter north of Los Angeles, but it’s often human nature that puts her in the path of danger. Just like when she helps rescue four adorable beagle puppies that were dumped down a drainpipe at a nasty puppy mill. One of the mill’s employees has a history of dog abuse-and a bone to pick with Lauren. And when he’s found dead at HotRescues after threatening her, Lauren will have to sniff out the real killer to keep herself out of a cage…

My Thoughts

Beaglemania by Linda O Johnston was just not the book for me. I really don’t have any nice things to say about this book. The main character drove me bat shit crazy. Lauren Vancouver is a great advocate for animals but she is power hungry. As the director of Hot Rescues she oversees the adoptions of all of their animals. Any animal lover would want to make sure that the adoption was solid. The animals at Hot Rescues have already had it rough or they wouldn’t be there. Do I have to be told roughly six times that no adoption is approved until she gives the final say so? It came off as overbearing not caring.

The other thing that bothered me about this book is the number of times Lauren’s Blackberry was mentioned. Honestly Blackberry should have sponsored the publication of this book simply for the number of times it was name dropped. Lauren never answered her cell; she answered her Blackberry. I understand that this book isn’t geared towards 20 somethings, but in 2011 do we really need to spend paragraphs explaining the benefits of adding a phone number to your contacts?

Clearly this book was not meant for me. I haven’t even talked about the secondary characters or the mystery. I enjoyed the secondary characters more then I did the main character. When Efram’s killer was revealed it wasn’t an “Ah ha!” moment; it was more like an “Oh yeah. That makes sense.” moment. It just fell flat for me. This was a first book from Johnston for me. I will almost always give an author another chance. I will try another book by Johnston and hope that Beaglemania just struck me odd.

Other Reviews

Fresh Fiction
Steph the Bookworm

Series Reading Order

1. Beaglemania