When bookstore owner Claire Malloy agrees to pet sit for Nick and Nora, two pampered bassetts, they quickly vanish on her watch. When she discovers there's a blackmailing dognapper who runs a pit-fight gambling ring loose in town, she gets really mad--and when Claire gets mad, she gets even....
From Publishers Weekly
Agreeing to care for two basset hounds while their elderly owner is away, bookseller Claire Malloy is introduced to the underworld of pet snatchers.redundant, if they're stolen When the hounds left in her care disappear, Claire discovers other neighborhood pets in her small university town are also missing. A check at the animal shelter turns up the information that the unsavory Newton Churls runs an operation licensed to sell animals for medical research. An official inspection, authorized by an unwilling sheriff, proves unavailing. The bereft pet owners and Claire's teenage daughter Caron attempt a nighttime commando raid; when Claire follows them, she finds Churls torn to death by his pit bulls. On the lam to keep up the search and avoid being called as a material witness, Claire is attacked by several unsavory country boys at an animal sale; a ransom demand further complicates the case. Hess again provides lively and diverting entertainment via her brash and articulate detective, last seen in A Diet to Die For .
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Kirkus Reviews
Farberville's bookstore-owner/occasional sleuth Claire Malloy (A Diet to Die For, etc.) has consented to care for Emily Parchester's African violets and basset hounds, Nick and Nora, while Emily takes a trip. Days later, the hounds have disappeared, along with the various pets of neighbors on the block, and Claire is in the middle of a plot to recover them from the filthy quarters of nasty Newton Churls, notorious local animal-dealer. Not so easy, especially after Churls is killed by his pit bulls--not accidentally; Claire's warned off by the local law; a couple of Churls's brutish redneck pals are prowling the neighborhood, and Claire's teenaged daughter, Caron, and friend Inez undertake some heroics of their own. Another of the author's ditsy mixes--a worthy issue; a few eccentrics; lots of ill-advised forays into danger; and a blithe heroine whose ironic reflections often produce a chuckle. Of special interest to dedicated animal-lovers. -- Copyright 1991, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
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