Some Like It Hawk soars....

I hope I whet your appetite for more of Donna Andrews world of Meg Langslow with my previous post on "Murder with Peacocks".  'Cause "Some Like It Hawk" is wonderful!  I do want to mention that if you skipped "The Real Macaw" you might not understand all the backstory, but Donna does a wonderful job of filling you in on the highpoints at the onset.  Here's the blurb:

 Meg Langslow is plying her blacksmith's trade at “Caerphilly Days,” a festival inspired by her town’s sudden notoriety as "The Town That Mortgaged Its Jail." The lender has foreclosed on all Caerphilly's public buildings, and all employees have evacuated —except one.  Phineas Throckmorton, the town clerk, has been barricaded in the courthouse basement for over a year.

  Mr. Throckmorton's long siege has only been possible because of a pre-Civil War tunnel leading from the courthouse basement to a crawl space beneath the bandstand. The real reason for Caerphilly Days is to conceal the existence of the tunnel:  the tourist crowds camouflage supply deliveries, and the ghastly screeching of the tunnel's rusty trap door is drowned out by as many noisy activities as the locals can arrange. But the lender seems increasingly determined to evict Mr. Throckmorton—and may succeed after one of its executives is found shot, apparently from inside the basement.  Meg and her fellow townspeople suspect that someone hopes to end the siege by framing Mr. Throckmorton. Unless the real killer can be found quickly, the town will have to reveal the secret of the tunnel—and the fact that they've been aiding and abetting the basement’s inhabitant. Meg soon deduces that the killer isn't just trying to end the siege but to conceal information that would help the town reclaim its buildings—if the townspeople can find it before the lender destroys it in a gut-busting caper that will have giggles and guffaws coming as fast as a four-alarm fire.

All my favorite characters are back with Meg.  Donna has delivered a wonderful whodunit with her usual flair for dialogue.  I enjoyed the twists and turns that she led me on while giving me moments to laugh.  The villian made sense - once he was, literally, unmasked.  And the conspiracy - I won't give that away here.  And yes, I've read it 5 times already.

Another reason for joy - IT'S ALSO AVAILABLE AS AN AUDIOBOOK!!!  Yes, I read - and I read alot.  But, I also listen to audiobooks as I do housework, take my walks, etc.  I have listened to "Crouching Buzzard, Leaping Loon" (which is hilarious - no matter how you discover it) and "We'll Always Have Parrots" (which offers a slight wink to the world of cult tv fandom) so many times that if they weren't MP3 files, I might have worn them out by now.  Bernadette Dunne does a fantastic job bringing Meg's adventures to life.  Now, if only the other 11 books would become available this way....

So, my suggestion - Run, don't walk to your favorite bookseller (or surf the net as fast as you can) for the latest hilarious, twisy-turny Meg Langslow mystery.  You won't be sorry you did.