Donna Andrews – Meg Langslow #2 2000
Because most, if not all, of this series is available in audio format on Scribd, I may be reviewing more of the series.
Murder With Puffins finds Meg Langslow and her boyfriend Michael on a ferry off the coast of Maine, headed toward her aunt’s cottage on the island of Monhegan. They are crippled by seasickness – and no wonder! The huge swells in the ocean are due to an approaching hurricane. The couple hopes for some time alone, but when their queasy journey ends and they arrive at the cabin, they find Meg’s family is already there. And of course, before too long there’s a murder on the island.
This is a perfectly respectable cozy; Meg’s voice is wryly humorous and the setting creates its own tension, filled as it is with bad weather and eccentric birders and islanders. With the exception of Meg’s father, her family members seem to have lost a little of the quirkiness that delighted readers of Murder With Peacocks, and narrator Bernadette Dunne gives Meg’s Virginia mother the voice of a Minnesota housewife. To be fair, if I hadn’t read the first book in the series, I wouldn’t even be considering these things; in fact, this could easily be a standalone. No need to read #1 first. Book and narrator both rate four stars.