I received this book for free from my own shelves in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.
Source: my own shelves
Owl Be Home for Christmas
by
Donna Andrews
It is part of the Meg Langslow #26, series and is a amateur sleuth, cozy mystery in a Kindle edition that was published by Minotaur Books on October 15, 2019 and has 297 pages.
Explore it on Goodreads or Amazon
Other books in this series include [books_series]
Other books by this author which I have reviewed include The Real Macaw, Some Like It Hawk, The Hen of the Baskervilles, Duck the Halls, The Good, the Bad, and the Emus, Lord of the Wings, The Nightingale Before Christmas, Die Like an Eagle, Gone Gull, How the Finch Stole Christmas!, Toucan Keep a Secret, Lark! The Herald Angels Sing, The Falcon Always Wings Twice, The Gift of the Magpie, The Twelve Jays of Christmas, Murder with Peacocks, Murder with Puffins, Revenge of the Wrought Iron Flamingos, Crouching Buzzard, Leaping Loon, We’ll Always Have Parrots, Owls Well That Ends Well, Terns of Endearment, Between a Flock and a Hard Place, No Nest for the Wicket, The Penguin Who Knew Too Much, Cockatiels at Seven, Six Geese A-Slaying, Stork Raving Mad, Murder Most Fowl, Round Up the Usual Peacocks, Dashing Through the Snowbirds, Birder, She Wrote, Let It Crow! Let It Crow! Let It Crow!, Rockin' Around the Chickadee
The twenty-sixth in the Meg Langslow amateur sleuth cozy mystery series revolving around Meg, a blacksmith and mother with a nose for clues. The focus is on the ornithology conference, although Andrews doesn’t stint on the Christmas cheer.
My Take
Omigod, those Ackleys! How brainless can you be? It’s a storm for the centuries and they expect vehicles to be going anywhere?
I can’t help but love the Langslow-Waterstons. They’re intelligent and decent people raising two inquiring sons and they take the time to help people. Help that sometimes includes taking in whole crowds to camp out at the farm, lol.
This story takes place during a meeting of ornithologists discussing everything owls — owl porn, anyone? Poor Meg is under fire from several idiots, and we get to hear all about how she feels through Andrews’ use of first person protagonist point-of-view from Meg’s perspective.
With Meg, we’re behind the scenes, and oh boy, there’s equal amounts of action on both sides. I had no idea owls could be such a hot topic. Of course, any field in which people are interested will have those same debates, lol. Add in all those personalities, and it’s a riot.
I had to laugh, as well, at Meg’s perception of these ornithologists being sedentary souls. The conference attendees quickly change her mind. Josh and Jamie certainly aren’t sedentary — I’d love to check out their tunnel system.
That Frogmore. What a piece of work! If you feel a need to hate on somebody, he’s perfect. A perfect scum bag in so many ways. I wanna kill him! And Czerny is danged close. Hmm, seems that Dr Lanville isn’t a fan either. It’s amazing how Andrews fits in so many idiots?!
Melissa likes that Dr Blake is only prejudiced against stupidity.
Grandfather doesn’t hold back, although he’s more “diplomatic” than I expected: “My conference, my choice”, lol.
Oh, oh, oh, wait’ll you read the big dinner scene. ROFLMAO, omigod, “Poor” Dr Frogmore, ahem, *laughing*. If ever you needed a reason to know American Sign Language. On a sad note, Andrews notes the reason why you should be careful about mixing medications.
For those of you into owls and environmental issues, a lot of the arguing revolves around the barred owl versus the northern spotted owl. A greater issue is that there is a preference for “harvesting” the owl. Yep, it’s a euphemism.
Again, ROFLMAO, during the videotaping of the hostage situation, participants are probably thinking of calling out “amen” and “sing it, brother”.
Meg reckons Grandfather was hoping for a different major topic, more along his own lines. He’s also disappointed in who accepted his invitations.
Ya gotta love Ekaterina for the consideration she puts in for making the shelter-in-place more festive if they’re going to be snowed in. It’s definitely a task for Mother, lol. And thank god, she hired Mother to replace those stupid books-by-the-yard! Ick.
Oh, I could wish that the Meg Langslow series would be coopted for television, if only to watch the SPOORs do their entertainment routine! Thinking about it, this series is ripe for television. There’s always so much going on!
Truly, Owl Be Home for Christmas is one big laugh fest. Although I wouldn’t put a lot of faith in the “official” summary that’s on Amazon and Goodreads. I don’t think the writer of it actually read the book.
The Story
Grandfather’s timing isn’t wonderful, but the ornithology conference is proving a success until a blizzard roars in and strands everyone.
Luckily, it’s Meg and Ekaterina to the rescue, providing organization and Christmas cheer . . . until . . . murder!
The Characters
Meg Langslow may be a blacksmith by trade, but by temperament she’s an excellent organizer. You guessed it, Meg is organizing her grandfather’s Owl Fest. Dr Michael Waterston is Meg’s husband who teaches drama at the college. Josh and Jamie are their resourceful twin sons.
Rose Noire Keenan is Meg’s cousin who runs an organic herb farm and lives at Meg and Michael’s house along with Meg’s brother, Rob Langslow, who owns Mutant Wizards, a highly successful computer company. Delaney is Rob’s fiancée. Grandfather, a.k.a. Great, is Dr Montgomery “Monty” Blake, a famous animal-rights activist and environmentalist. He, or I suspect, the Blake Foundation own the Caerphilly Zoo. Trevor Ponsonby-West is Grandfather’s assistant. Dad, Dr James Langslow, is his son and fascinated by so many things, including emergency medicine. Mother is the classy decorator who keeps her finger on the pulse. Grandmother Cordelia, Dad’s mother, lives out of town. Kevin, Meg’s nephew, is a computer genius who lives in her basement.
Caerphilly, Virginia, is . . .
. . . home for Caerphilly College and Meg and Michael’s farmhouse. Henry Burke is the chief of police and had been a homicide detective in Baltimore. Cousin Horace Hollingsworth is one of his deputies, an EMT, and Caerphilly’s only CSI tech. Vern Shiffley is another deputy. Debbie Ann is the police dispatcher, who knows Meg too well.
Minerva is Burke’s wife and they’re raising their three orphaned grandchildren: Adam Jones Burke, the youngest, is Josh and Jamie’s best friend; Calvin Ripken Burke; and, Frank Robinson Burke. What can I say, their parents were passionate about baseball.
The Caerphilly Inn is a five-star hotel managed by Ekaterina Vorobyaninova. Sami is the desk clerk who’s going for a degree in meteorology. Eduardo is the duty bartender. Raoul can be usefully obsequious. Serafina and Chantal are part of the housekeeping staff. Non-conference guests include Jim and Jane Ackley who live, unhappily, in Florida. He retired from Ackley and Sons.
At the Owl Fest convention, attendees include Dr Oliver Frogmore, the most obnoxious person and who is in the running for Most Annoying Conference Participant. He teaches at Buckthorn College. Dr Edward “Ned” Czerny is Frogmore’s put-upon assistant and running second for that award. Dr Vera Craine has an academic history with Frogmore and now teaches at Cornell, a school with better ratings than Buckthorn. Dr Benjamin Green is one of the nicer ones and a most absent-minded professor — he and Rose Noire get on like a house on fire. Dr Nils Lindquist is a friend of Green’s. Dr Kelner. Dr George and Mrs Voss. Dr Bateman, a British scientist, presents on new species. Dr Etsuji Hirano only speaks Japanese, so Dr Hiro Arai will translate for him on his new finds in the Philippines. R.G. Smith, Jeff Whitmore, and Daniel Belasco are “rooming” together. Dr Chwalibog Fijalkowski-Bartosiewicz’s name is always being misspelled. I wonder why? And yes, I went back myself and checked *grin* Dr Lachlan Pearce is from Sydney. Melissa McKendrick is helping out with processing. She volunteers at the zoo’s aviary and realizes she’s completely normal *roflmao*. Ethan Zander is another student volunteer. Percival is the great horned owl Grandfather brought for demonstration purposes — he’s a lifesaver.
Dr Hosmer Peverel is the Buckthorn College president. Dr Thomas Lanville is Frogmore’s primary care doctor. Julia Taylor is a grad student whose fate has Dr Blake upset.
Dagmar Shiffley owns a variety of working dogs. Osgood and Beau Shiffley own and operate the county’s only snowplows. Randall Shiffley is the mayor and their cousin. SPOOR, Stop Poisoning Our Owls and Raptors, is a local bird conservation group. Dr Clarence Rutledge is the veterinarian locally and for the zoo — he’s snowed in with his patients. Judge Jane Shiffley is one of Meg’s friends. Ellie Draper is the head librarian. The Reverend Robyn Smith is a reader. Deacon Petrie drives a bus. Muriel’s Diner caters the meals at the jail. Morton’s is the local funeral home.
The Cover and Title
The cover is great fun with its midnight sky gradating from navy blue to royal blue. The graphic is of an owl wearing a Santa hat and a green-and-white striped scarf carrying an aluminum suitcase full of Christmas cheer. Maybe this is how Santa does it, as the contents — presents, a candy cane, holly, and more — are spilling out of it. The owl is flying above the snow-covered rooftops of a charming village. At the top is the author’s name in red with the letters of her last name jumbled. Below that is an info blurb in white. The title is in a pale yellow on a curving slant above the owl. To the right, below the owl’s wing is the series info in white.
The title is more of a dream than reality, as Meg hopes Owl Be Home for Christmas.
